Information Processing Biases Caused by Device Associations
Madeleine Steeds, Sarah Clinch, Caroline Jay · Electronic workshops in computing · 2024
Various associations are made with technological devices ( e.g., smartphones are associated with being social). Previous work found that associations and stereo typescanimpactthespeedatwhichinformation is processed.Howeverthereislimitedknowledgeregardingiftheassociationswemakewiththedeviceswe use effectinformationprocessingspeeds.Inthisstudy,participantsusedadesktop/laptoporasmartphone to viewwordsassociatedwiththesedevices.Theywereaskedtoindicatethecolourthewordwaswritten in andthetimetakentocompletethetaskwasmeasured.Theresultssuggestedthatwordsrelatedtothe devicebeingusedledtolongerresponsetimes,indicatingthatstimuliassociatedwiththedevicebeing used canslowdowninformationprocessing.Thissuggeststhatthedevicebeingusedmayimpactcognitive processes, which maybe problematic inresearchusingtechnologytoassesstheseabilities. The further implications for user experience are also discussed.