Exploring the Ergonomic Issues of User-Defined Mid-Air Gestures for Interactive Product Exhibition

Recently, the applications of 3D and mid-air hand gestures have increased significantly in public and interactive display systems. Due to the context and user differences, it is necessary to consider user-defined gestures at the design stage of the system development. However, user-defined gestures may not be able to conform to the requirements of ergonomics without in-depth studies and careful selection. Therefore, the objective of this research is to develop a systematic method for extraction and evaluation of user-defined gestures from ergonomic perspectives. In this research, a behavior coding scheme was developed to analyze gestures for six tasks of interactive product exhibition. The results indicated that hand dorsiflexion caused by the posture of opening palm and facing forward was the common ergonomic issue identified from user-defined gestures. In order to reduce discomfort of prolonged gesture controls, the alternative combinations of gestures for accomplishing these tasks was determined based on ergonomic limitations and the considerations of vision-based hand gesture recognitions.