Accepted for/Published in: JMIR mHealth and uHealth
Date Submitted: Apr 24, 2019
Open Peer Review Period: Apr 30, 2019 - Jun 19, 2019
Date Accepted: Jul 6, 2019
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
User Experience of Seven Mobile EEG Devices: Experimental Study
ABSTRACT
Background:
Registration of brain activity becomes more and more popular and offers a way to identify the mental state of the user, prevent inappropriate workload, and control other devices by means of brain-computer interfaces. However, the registration of the EEG is often related to user-acceptance issues regarding the measuring technique. In the meanwhile, emerging mobile EEG technology offers the possibility of gel-free signal acquisition and wireless signal transmission. Nonetheless, user experience research about the new devices is lacking.
Objective:
In this article we aimed to evaluate user experience aspects of emerging mobile EEG devices and in particular investigate wearing comfort and issues related to the research field of emotional design.
Methods:
We considered seven mobile EEG devices and compared them regarding their wearing comfort, type of electrodes, visual appearance, and subjects' preference for daily use. Twenty-four subjects participated in our study and tested every device independently of the others. The devices were selected in randomized order and worn on consecutive-day sessions of 60 min duration. At the end of each session, subjects rated the devices by means of questionnaires.
Results:
Results indicated a highly-significant change in maximal-possible wearing duration between the EEG devices (Χ^2=40.215, df=6, n=24, P<.001). Regarding the visual perception of devices' headset design, results indicated a significant change in subjects' ratings (Χ^2=78.663, df=6, n=24, P<.001). Results of subjects' ratings regarding the practicability of the devices indicated highly-significant differences between the EEG devices (Χ^2=83.185, df=6, n=24, P<.001). Ranking order and post-hoc tests offered more insight and indicated that pin electrodes had the smallest wearing comfort, in particular when coupled with a rigid, heavy headset. Finally, multiple linear regression for each device separately revealed that users were not willing to accept less comfort for a more attractive headset design.
Conclusions:
The study offers a differentiated look at emerging mobile and gel-free EEG recording technology as well as at the relation between user-experience aspects and device preference. Our research could be seen as a precondition for the development of usable applications with wearables and contributes to consumer health informatics and health-enabling technologies. Furthermore, our results provided guidance for the technological-development direction of new EEG devices related to aspects of emotional design.
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