Gaze'N'Touch: Enhancing Text Selection on Mobile Devices Using Gaze

Text selection is a frequent task we do everyday to edit, modify or delete text. Selecting a word requires not only precision but also switching between selections and typing which influences both speed and error rates. We evaluate a novel concept, extending text editing with an additional modality, that is gaze. We present a user study (N=16) where we explore how the novel concepts, referred to as GazeButton, can improve text selection and compare it to touch-based selection. We also tested the effect of text size on the selection techniques by comparing two different text sizes. Results show that gaze-based selection was faster with larger text size, although not statistically significant. Qualitative feedback show a preference for gaze over touch, motivating a new direction of gaze usage in text editors.