Fitts Law as a Restrained Random Walk

Fitts law, one of the rare quantitative relations in psychology, describes the time it takes for a human being to aim at and hit a target of a given size, starting from a given remote position. We provide here a new interpretation of this law, not invoking a discretization of space and time as in th...

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Main Author: Villermaux, Emmanuel
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Académie des sciences 2024-04-01
Series:Comptes Rendus. Mécanique
Online Access:https://comptes-rendus.academie-sciences.fr/mecanique/articles/10.5802/crmeca.250/
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author Villermaux, Emmanuel
author_facet Villermaux, Emmanuel
author_sort Villermaux, Emmanuel
collection DOAJ
description Fitts law, one of the rare quantitative relations in psychology, describes the time it takes for a human being to aim at and hit a target of a given size, starting from a given remote position. We provide here a new interpretation of this law, not invoking a discretization of space and time as in the original information theory representation of Fitts, but involving a simple restrained random walk on a continuum, in space and time. We not only predict that the pointing time is proportional to the logarithm of the starting distance relative to the target size (which is Fitts law), but also describe the complete probability of presence of the pointer in its route to destination. In particular, we quantify the pointer large time overlapping efficiency with the target from the comparison of a new length-scale intrinsic to the motion, with the target size.
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spelling doaj-art-ce40e946418c473e946d17cef10e5a652025-02-07T13:48:46ZengAcadémie des sciencesComptes Rendus. Mécanique1873-72342024-04-01352G113514210.5802/crmeca.25010.5802/crmeca.250Fitts Law as a Restrained Random WalkVillermaux, Emmanuel0Aix Marseille Université, CNRS, Centrale Marseille, IRPHE, Marseille, FranceFitts law, one of the rare quantitative relations in psychology, describes the time it takes for a human being to aim at and hit a target of a given size, starting from a given remote position. We provide here a new interpretation of this law, not invoking a discretization of space and time as in the original information theory representation of Fitts, but involving a simple restrained random walk on a continuum, in space and time. We not only predict that the pointing time is proportional to the logarithm of the starting distance relative to the target size (which is Fitts law), but also describe the complete probability of presence of the pointer in its route to destination. In particular, we quantify the pointer large time overlapping efficiency with the target from the comparison of a new length-scale intrinsic to the motion, with the target size.https://comptes-rendus.academie-sciences.fr/mecanique/articles/10.5802/crmeca.250/
spellingShingle Villermaux, Emmanuel
Fitts Law as a Restrained Random Walk
Comptes Rendus. Mécanique
title Fitts Law as a Restrained Random Walk
title_full Fitts Law as a Restrained Random Walk
title_fullStr Fitts Law as a Restrained Random Walk
title_full_unstemmed Fitts Law as a Restrained Random Walk
title_short Fitts Law as a Restrained Random Walk
title_sort fitts law as a restrained random walk
url https://comptes-rendus.academie-sciences.fr/mecanique/articles/10.5802/crmeca.250/
work_keys_str_mv AT villermauxemmanuel fittslawasarestrainedrandomwalk