An empirical comparison of menu-selection (CUI) and desktop (GUI) computer programs carried out by beginners and experts

Abstract As advantages and disadvantages of graphical user interfaces are still controversial, this study focuses on an empirical comparison of a desktop interface (GUI) and a conventional user interface with menu selection (CUI). A total of 24 users (six novices and six experts with GUI; six novices and six experts with CUI). were given 20 benchmark tasks. Except for an introduction given by the investigator (1·5 h) the beginners had no or very little previous experience with electronic data processing, while the experts had previous experience of 3,700 h (desktop) or 7,500 h (menu selection), respectively. The results showed for both beginners and experts a statistically significant superiority of GUI of the desktop user interface with ‘mouse’ over the conventional user interface with menu selection and function keys (CUI). The experts in GUI needed 51% less time to complete the tasks averaged across all tasks, as compared to the experts using CUI. Moreover a significant interaction was found between ta...