A comparison of voice controlled and mouse controlled web browsing

Voice controlled web browsers allow users to navigate by speaking the text of a link or an associated number instead of clicking with a mouse. One such browser is Conversa, by Conversational Computing. This within subjects study with 18 subjects compared voice browsing with traditional mouse-based browsing. It attempted to identify which of three common hypertext forms (linear slide show, grid/tiled map, and hierarchical menu) are well suited to voice navigation, and whether voice navigation is helped by numbering links. The study shows that voice control adds approximately 50% to the performance time for certain types of tasks. Subjective satisfaction measures indicate that for voice browsing, textual links are preferable to numbered links. Keywords Human-computer interaction, user interfaces, voice browsers, voice recognition, web browsing

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2000
• Where: ASSETS
• Authors: Kevin Christian, Bill Kules, Ben Shneiderman, Adel M. Youssef
• Keywords: ASSETS 2000, Emerging Technology, Subjects Compared Voice, Voice Controlled Web, Voice Navigation