Workload on your fingertips: the influence of workload on touch-based drag and drop

In this paper we explore if it is possible to recognize different cognitive states of a user through analyzing drag and drop behavior on a tablet device. We introduce a modified version of the classic Stroop task, which is a commonly used psychological stressor and investigate how different levels of perceived workload correlate with measures related to fingertip movement during drag and drop. A study with 24 participants is reported, where we were able to replicate the Stroop effect in a touch-based drag and drop task and present 2 measures in fingertip movement that correlate with subjective ratings of workload based on the NASA-TLX questionnaire.