How Memorizing Positions or Directions Affects Gesture Learning?

Various techniques have been proposed to faster command selection. Many of them either rely on directional gestures (e.g. Marking menus) or pointing gestures using a spatially-stable arrangement of items (e.g. FastTap). Both types of techniques are known to leverage memorization, but not necessarily for the same reasons. In this paper, we investigate whether using directions or positions affects gesture learning. Our study shows that, while recall rates are not significantly different, participants used the novice mode more often and spent more time while learning commands with directional gestures, and they also reported more physical and mental efforts. Moreover, this study also highlights the importance of semantic relationships between gestural commands and reports on the memorization strategies that were elaborated by the participants.