The Influence of Eye Gaze Interaction Technique Expertise and the Guided Evaluation Method on Text Entry Performance Evaluations

Any investigation of learning unfamiliar text entry systems is affected by the need to train participants on multiple new components simultaneously, such as novel interaction techniques and layouts. The Guided Evaluation Method (GEM) addresses this challenge by bypassing the need to learn layout-specific skills for text entry. However, a gap remains as the GEM's performance has not been assessed in situations where users are unfamiliar with the interaction technique involved, here eye-gaze-based dwell. To address this, we trained participants on only the eye-gaze-based interaction technique over eight days with QWERTY and then evaluated their performance on the OPTI layout with the GEM. Results showed that the unfamiliar OPTI layout outperformed QWERTY, with QWERTY's speed aligning with previous findings, suggesting that interaction technique expertise significantly impacts performance outcomes. Importantly, we also identified that for scenarios where the familiarity with the involved interaction technique(s) is the same, the GEM analyzes the performance of keyboard layouts effectively and quickly identifies the best option.