One-handed Thumb Text-message through different Vertical position of Touchscreen QWERTY keyboard
Calvin Jeongheon Lee, Hye Jin Kum, Hyoung-taek Lim, Frank A. Biocca · Advanced science and technology letters · 2014
Most of physical QWERTY keyboard on PDA and mobile phone was located at bottom of device. According to orthopedics research, this bottom placement of the physical QWERTY keyboard can create unhealthy finger typing experience. Even though smartphone Touchscreen QWERTY keyboard can improve this placement limitation, most of the current smartphone's Touchscreen QWERTY keyboards are still located at bottom of the Touchscreen. We made prototype Touchscreen QWERTY keyboards that can be placed on top, middle and bottom of iPhone5. We collected one-hand operated typing performance data from three different positions to measure typo-error frequency and time for sending. Outcome of result was the bottom position was the least preferred vertical position to smartphone users. This result suggests the Touchscreen QWERTY keyboard need to be repositioned either to middle or to top of the device to improve user experience.