Interactivity to Enhance Perception: Does Increased Interactivity in Mobile Visual Presentation Tools Facilitate More Accurate Rating of Textile Properties?

To create a better next-generation textile-browsing interface for iOS devices, we need to establish which elements of an interface are responsible for communicating which textile qualities. It has already been shown that interactive decision making aids help consumers to make much better decisions with substantially less effort [2]. We will attempt to understand how such decision making aids can be best designed to accurately portray the desired qualities of the product; in this case textiles. Shoppers indicate the See-Touch-Handle factor as most important but missing when buying clothing online [4] and it has been found that the risk that presentations in online shops may not fully correspond to the real product affects shoppers enjoyment of their experience [3]. In a series of studies we will evaluate the impact of visual information, interaction, sound, and simple vibrotactile feedback. Using the findings of these studies it should be possible to target different interfaces at different applications. For example, the interfaces for clothing textiles could be designed to emphasise desired attributes like softness and furryness, while interfaces for industrial textiles could use modalities better suited to communicating durability and roughness.