Goal crossing vs area pointing for people with motor impairments

Prior work has highlighted the challenges faced by people with motor impairments when trying to acquire on-screen targets using a mouse or trackball. Two reasons for this are the difficulty of positioning the mouse cursor within a confined area, and the challenge of accurately executing a click. We hypothesize that both of these difficulties with area pointing may be alleviated in a different target acquisition paradigm called "goal crossing." In goal crossing, users do not acquire a confined area, but instead pass over a target line. Although goal crossing has been studied for able-bodied users, its suitability for people with motor impairments is unknown. In our study, participants with motor impairments were faster with and preferred goal-crossing to area pointing. This work provides the empirical foundation from which to pursue the design of crossing-based interfaces as accessible alternatives to pointing-based interfaces.