Effects of drag-and-response interaction mechanism of multi-touch operated tabletop technology on users' awareness and collaborative performance

In this study we proposed drag-and-response interaction mechanism of multi-touch operated tabletop technology which features a queue area, a rubber band and a transfer animation function. We conducted one experiment by applying our proposed drag-and-response and existing drag-and-drop and drag-and-pop mechanisms, one at a time, to support collaborative tasks on a large-size tabletop display. This study aimed to compare collaborative performance of participants on tasks with different interaction mechanisms and to explore effects of drag-and-response mechanism on awareness and collaboration of participants. Perceptions of participants toward using drag-and-response mechanism were also investigated. Results of this study revealed that drag-and-drop and drag-and-pop are not convenient mechanisms for collaborative work on a tabletop display. According to the results, drag-and-drop mechanism resulted in more exchange errors, while there were several conflicts and uncoordinated behaviors during collaborative work with drag-and-pop mechanism. Further investigation through questionnaire and interview surveys revealed that drag-and-response is beneficial for facilitating awareness and cohesive collaboration due to its functions, such as a queue area, rubber band and transfer animation. Moreover, the results showed that the rubber band facilitated participants to work with remote targets on a multi-touch tabletop display easily and the queue area enabled participants to control flow of coins into a personal panel and out of it.