Characterizing Pairs Collaboration in a Mobile-equipped Shared-Wall Display Supported Collaborative Setup

Recent advancements in mobile devices encourage researchers to utilize them in collaborative environments as a medium to interact with large shared wall-displays. In this paper, we focus on a semi-controlled user study that we conducted to measure the collaborative coupling ratio between partners working in pairs in a collaborative setup equipped with a shared tiled-wall display and multiple mobile devices. We invited 36 participants in 18 pairs to take part in our experiment in order to analyze how they communicate and collaborate with each other during the experiment. We observed their collaborative coupling by measuring how often they verbally and visually communicated. Further, we found frequently used collaborative physical position patterns by observing the pairs' physical arrangements and standing positions. Moreover, we combined these factors to gain a clearer understanding of coupling in our setup, taking into account the mobility factor offered by the mobile devices. Results of the study show interesting findings about the coupling factors between the partners mainly due to the flexibility offered by including mobile devices in our collaborative setup.
Comment: Keywords: Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW); Tiled-Wall Collaborative Environment; Coupling; Smart Devices; User Study; Collaborative Relation Building. 36 pages, 10 figures