Physical Layout of the Lab

The lab is partitioned into three areas: (1) two participant rooms (2) an observation room, and (3) a waiting lounge.

Participant Rooms

Experiments are conducted in the two participant rooms. Both rooms have the same hardware configurations, including a Microsoft Windows-based personal computer, web camera with a built-in microphone, and speakers. The web camera is used to capture the participants’ facial expressions. The built-in microphone is designed to record participants’ verbalizations as part of the thinking aloud protocol found in many studies.
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Observation Room

The observation room is located between the two participant rooms. The observation room is equipped with two-way mirrors attached to the participant rooms to facilitate observations during experiments. The observation room is also equipped with a shared laser printer; speakers; and two Microsoft Windows-based computers, each of which can be connected to the participant rooms and to the Internet. In addition, the computers in the observation room have dual-monitor settings.