Title: A Diary Study of Task Switching and Interruptions
1A Diary Study of Task Switching and Interruptions
Toward Understanding Supporting Multitasking
Mary Czerwinski Eric Horvitz Susan
Wilhite Microsoft Research
2Motivation and Goals
- Hypothesis Current MS software does not support
multitasking well - How bad/universal is the problem?
- Seek SW design ideas
- Research shows users developing workaround
strategies - Interruptions research shows harmful effects of
incoming notifications on current task - Memory for To Dos notoriously poor,
undersupported
3Approach
- Earlier Work
- Characterize memory for important computing
events - Memory augmentation systemswill they work?
- Current Study
- Capture nature of interruptions in typical users
day - Characterize frequency of task switch/returns
- Gather data on what constitutes a task
- Long-term Goal Design new UIs for
semi-automated, efficient access to prior task
contexts
4Memory Research
- ? Retrospective Memory
- Memory for past eventsorganized into episodes
- Strong Cues people, place, key events, (time)
- Not much computer support traditionally
(calendar) - Prospective Memory ?
- Memory for future actions or events
- Retrieval cues often internally generated (must
remember to remember), but people, places prompt
too - Relies some on retrospective memory for cuing
event - More computer support via reminders
- Users still use all kinds of alternative methods
to remember stuff
5Previous Work
- Prospective memory failures are a serious problem
for information workers (Eldridge, Sellen
Bekerian, 1992 Terry, 1988) - Users come up with unique ways of remembering
(Gwizdka, 2000 Jones, Bruce Dumais, 2001) - Users memories for computing events erode
quickly (Czerwinski Horvitz, 2002) - Still little is known about the mechanisms for
bringing intentions to mind (Sellen et al., 1992) - Or how technology could be used to reduce
forgetting after a task switch or interruption
6Memory Prostheses
- Video diaries (Lamming et al., 1994)
- Useful, but require real time for review
- Personal stills (Czerwinski et al., 2002) work
well - Still require efficient browsing mechanism
- Hard to automatically detect key stills
- Action history explanations for programming
error recovery (Renaud, 2000) - Forget Me Not (Lamming and Flyn, 1994)first
wearable - Continuously logged users physical location,
workstation activities, file exchange and
printing, phone calls, email, and other users
present - Filter based on person, place, object, time, etc.
7Memory Prostheses (Continued)
- Remembrance Agent (Rhodes Starner,
1996)automatic text retrieval based on users
current location - Time Machine Computing (Rekimoto, 1999)access to
desktop contents in past or future - Cyberminder (Dey Abowd, 2000)
- Memory Glasses (Pentland et al., 2000)
- Lifestreams (Gelernter et al. 96), etc.
- These techniques seem usefulwould they help the
average information worker?
8Diary Study
- What are the important issues related to novel sw
design for multitasking? - Does it seem memory prosthesis would help?
- Wanted to characterize task switching
- Over multiple days
- In situ
- Users own descriptions of how they multitask
9Participants
- 11 Participants recruited from a wide variety of
work backgrounds (1 dropped) - Professor, CAD programmer, web page designer,
boat salesman, graphics artist, developer, stock
broker, real estate agent, etc. - All participants were experienced computer users,
as per standardized screener - All reported they were responsible for multiple
projects at once, and proud of it - Good mix of deadline-driven v. self-directed
10Methods
- All users completed a baseline survey once
recruited - An excel spreadsheet was used as a diary
template to be filled out each day - Diaries emailed back to me each evening
- Participants instructed to write down every task
switch - how hard to switch, of docs required, of
interrupts experienced, task time, anything
forgotten, notes, etc.
11Partial diary for MS (6 hours)
12Task Descriptions for BH (6 hours)
- Daily Schedule Preparation
- Synch PocketPC
- Check Internet Email
- Check and respond to email
- Matlab coding
- Create Charts for Meeting
- Edit Word documents for meeting
- Meeting
- Matlab coding
13Overall Diary Results
- Threw out 1 participant (little task switching)
- Diaries were coded for Task Type, Switch Type
- Codes were validated between two researchers _at_
97 agreement - In addition, task times, difficulty ratings, of
interruptions and documents analyzed - Analyzed difference between task returns and
other task types - Used linear regression to identify key variables
14Task Breakdown
Indicative of Difficulty Tracking Tasks
Returned to Tasks from this group
15Number of Documents per Task (Conservative)
16Frequency of Interrupts (Conservative)
17Task Priority
18Task Times
19Frequency of Task Shift Initiators
20Overall Difficulty Switching Tasks
21Difficulty Switching by Type
22Difficulty Returning to Task by Elapsed Time
23Task Length by Type
24Document Requirements by Task Type
25Interruptions by Task Type
26Discussion of Findings
- During a given week, KWs task shift an awful lot
(avg. 50 task shifts weekly) - Long-term projects are more complex shifts
- Lengthier (11.25 of the week), more documents,
interrupts, returns - Rated significantly harder to return to
- Negative influence of interrupts on multitask
performance and memory well known - Passage of time also takes its toll
- What designs will help?
27General Design Ideas from Participants
- Smarter, adjustable To Do list tracking
alarming - In the projects versus just in Calendar
- Consider sticky notes for partial / future tasks
- Auto-categorization of email and files
- Better reminders for things forgotten
- Track events we know about and visualize them, or
rely on user manual tagging - Better user adaptivity
- e.g., knowing what kinds of paste operations a
user typically performs and automating them
28Focus on Returned to Tasks
- Elapsed time spanned hours to days
- Maintaining desktop state isnt always the answer
- Often, users said they were waiting on info from
other people or places (web, server)prospective
reminders needed here - Info came in via phone, email, web, or personal
contacts (better app integration needed here) - But reminding about task context and info
assembly / layout was a key problem identified
29Tools for Task Management
- GroupBar joins related items in the taskbar,
remembers spatial layouts of tasks (Smith et al.,
2003) - Desktop snapshots
- Can rehydrate tasks with the press of a button
- Scalable Fabric and VibeLog to be presented at
AVI 2004 - Visualizations of task activity a continued focus
- Future designs will merge all apps, across devices
30Timelines
- Task Timeline Visualizations Should Help
Information Workers - Rekimotos Time Machine Computing
- Gelertners Lifestreams,
- On the right track!
31Thanks for Your Attention
- Contact/Further Info
- marycz_at_microsoft.com
- http//research.microsoft.com/research/vibe
32Many Assume Disruptions are Unavoidable
- Recent focus on memory augmentation systems
- Reminder systems using automatically recognized
indices of computing events - But need to know what key events users
remember/forget and why - What external cues can be useful to them (Sellen
et al., 92) to aid retrieval? - When is such a system useful?