The Impact of Navigation Aids on Search Performance and Object Recall in Wide-Area Augmented Reality

TL;DR

This study evaluates how different AR navigation aids affect search efficiency and object recall in outdoor environments, revealing improvements in search but decreased physical object awareness.

Contribution

It compares three AR navigation aids in a wide-area outdoor setting, highlighting their impact on search performance and environmental awareness.

Findings

All aids improved search performance over control.

In-world arrows were most preferred by users.

Users recalled fewer physical objects than virtual ones.

Abstract

Head-worn augmented reality (AR) is a hotly pursued and increasingly feasible contender paradigm for replacing or complementing smartphones and watches for continual information consumption. Here, we compare three different AR navigation aids (on-screen compass, on-screen radar and in-world vertical arrows) in a wide-area outdoor user study (n=24) where participants search for hidden virtual target items amongst physical and virtual objects. We analyzed participants' search task performance, movements, eye-gaze, survey responses and object recall. There were two key findings. First, all navigational aids enhanced search performance relative to a control condition, with some benefit and strongest user preference for in-world arrows. Second, users recalled fewer physical objects than virtual objects in the environment, suggesting reduced awareness of the physical environment. Together, these findings suggest that while navigational aids presented in AR can enhance search task performance, users may pay less attention to the physical environment, which could have undesirable side-effects.