Effects of content and time of delivery on receptivity to mobile interruptions

In this paper we investigate effects of the content of interruptions and of the time of interruption delivery on mobile phones. We review related work and report on a naturalistic quasi-experiment using experience-sampling that showed that the receptivity to an interruption is influenced by its content rather than by its time of delivery in the employed modality of delivery - SMS. We also examined the underlying variables that increase the perceived quality of content and found that the factors interest, entertainment, relevance and actionability influence people's receptivity significantly. Our findings inform system design that seeks to provide context-sensitive information or to predict interruptibility and suggest the consideration of receptivity as an extension to the way we think and reason about interruptibility.

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