Human Media Interaction Summary

Human Media Interaction Theory
What is the role of HMIT?
- Highly complex and changing human needs and abilities
- Innovation and creative design processes
- Complex new media landscape
The psychological study of how people interact with media. Cognition and new media have
interplay with each other. Impact of media on cognitive function and what cognitive function
determine new media use.
Engagement:
- Metrics perspective: how much interaction does the user have with the product, and for
how long?
- Cognitive-psychological perspective: describing and understanding the experience of
engagement
Why do we care about engagement?
- Repeating activity
- Enjoyment
- Positive attitudes
- Enhanced learning outcomes
- Enhanced performance
- Sharing / recommending / adding / liking / posting
Usability: assess whether user interface is easy to use and meets requirements
UX: understand the deeper, personal experience of the user, engagement
Flow theory: the optimal experience. He got by this concept by doing interviews with experts of
chess players, rock climbers etc. They all mentioned to be in the zone when doing these things.
Flow is a state of holistic sensation that people feel when they act with total involvement, feel at
their best, perform at their best and therefore get a optimal experience.
Typical flow activities:
- Extreme sports
- Gaming
- Creative acts
All cognitive, affective and physical systems are all dedicated to the same task and goal. So total
vision on the task and not being disturbed by other stimulations and thoughts. Being in a bubble.
Losing yourself in a book.
Main feature of flow is Challenge-skill balance: what the task requires and what skills you have.
Low challenge and skill create apathy, it’s a state in which you don’t care and no motivation.

,Skill high and challenge low will create boredom or relaxation. A high challenge but low skill
creates anxiety. You don’t feel up to the task. Only when challenge and skill high you can get in
a flow.
Other features of flow are:
- Clear goals
- Unambiguous/immediate feedback
- Action-awareness mering
- Concentration
- Sense of control
- Loss of self-consciousness
- Transformation of time
- Autotelic experience
Gaming addictions are a type of flow experience that is counterproductive.
PAT model: the likelihood of an optimal experience depends on the interplay between:
- Person
- Artefact
- Task
Person:
- Traits (stable)
o Autotelic personality
 Ability to experience intrinsic enjoyment
 Moved by intrinsic motivation
o Inherent exploratory behavior
o Personal innovativeness
 Willingness to try new things
o Cognitive spontaneity
 Playfulness with a computer
o Trait of absorption
o Media literacy / skills
- State (fluctuates)
o Mood
o Motivation
o Arousal
o Focus
Artefact:
- Aesthetics
- Vividness

, - Speed of feedback / responsiveness (character moves directly when you press a button
instead of delay)
Task:
- Goal-oriented tasks  clear goal
- Autonomy  your task is not dependent on a computer or others
- Variety  not getting bored
PAT interactions:
- Task-technology fit (task x artefact)
- Clear task goals (person x task)
- Sense of control over task (person x task)
- Sense of control over artefact (person x task)
- Perceived ease of use (person x task)
o Important for complex tasks (person x task x artefact)
- Balance between skills and channels (person x task)
The trait attributes are the personality ones that are effectively unchanging. Some people tend to
be more likely to experience flow than others. The state attributes are dynamic; they represent
the mood ofthe user and will vary depending on the particular situation. The same person who
feels challenged and captivated by searching for information on the Web and experiences flow
frequently in such a situation, may have experiences where s/he feels either bored or anxious by
a search and will not experience flow.
Measurements of engagement:
- Option to ask people if they are engaged  self-report measures
o Biases in self-report
o Social desirability bias
o Only ask after experience
- Behavior measurements
Stages of engagement:
- Early fase: interface assessment and
physical interaction. Its about usability.
- Absorption:
- Digital outreach
Stages explained:
- Physical interaction: such as clicking
rates leads to better recall of content so
good for learning content.
- Interface assement: the initial evaluation
of the interace. Natural mapping: the ability of a system to map it controls in a natural

, and predicable manner. Intuitiveness: facilitating, efficient, cooperation and increasing
users enjoyement. Natural mapping and intuitiveness are related to ease of use.  can
enhance attitudes toward whole webisite and content
- Absorption  can enhance attitudes toward website. Is most directly addressed to the
degree participants pay attention
- Digital outreach: sharing content, bookmarking etc.  can enhance attitudes toward
whole webisite and content


Physiological outcomes:
- Skin conductance
- Heart rate
- Pupil dilation
- Electromyography
- Many of these indicate arousal levels
Problem: these are not only corelated with engagement but also with anxiety or stress.
Low and high levels of cardiovascular activation indicate relaxation or stress. Medium is flow.
Overall knowledge gaps:
- We need in-depth understanding of antecedents and features of flow/engagement
- We need better metrics
- We need to complement the subjective measures with online measure of flow or
engagement
Flow is the highest form of engagement.
Digital accessibility: websites, software etc. can be used by everyone.
Diversity of abilities:
- View
- Hearing
- Physical
- Mental
Blind /visual impaired: support for reading software, clear navigation
Deaf people: subtitles with video
Physical disability: keyboard accessibility
Cognitive disability: quiet lay out
Accessibility guidelines:
- Perceivable