Head Worn Display Studies

As part of my role as a student researcher at the contextual computing group, I have been tasked to conduct various studies that test certain applications of HWDs as well as find challenges in using them for everyday wear. These studies are intended to build towards publications. Two of the most resent studies have been on Remembrance Agent and Safety.

Remembrance agents are conversational aids that provide just-in-time information. Subtle head-up displays (SHUDs) can be used as these conversational aides, coaching wearers with conversational topics or just-in-time information cued by speech transcribed by modern recognition systems. SHUDs are also becoming more difficult to distinguish from normal eyeglasses. However, would the use of such smartglasses break the rapport between conversants? Would such aides actually improve conversations? Our studies on remembrance agent aim to address these questions.

With safety, our research aims to find the safest position in the visual field for using HWDs while walking. Participants wore a Microsoft Hololens 2 which will be used to simulate the different HWD positions in the visual field. Participants were tasked to read text on the HWD while walking around a path to the beat of a metronome to emulate a scenario of using HWD in daily life. We flashed the screen white and recorded the participant's read speed, natural walking speed, as well any missteps during the experiment.