Estimating cognitive overload in mobile applications for decision support within the medical domain

Abstract

Mobile applications have the potential to improve the quality of care received by patients from their primary care physicians (PCP). They can allow doctors to access the information they need when and where they need it in order to make informed decisions regarding patients' health. They can also allow patients to better control conditions such as Diabetes and Gaucher's disease. However, there are a number of limitations to these devices, such as small screen sizes and limited processing power, which can produce cognitive overload which in turn can negatively impact upon the decision making processes. This paper introduces a new research direction which aims to predict, during the development of mobile health care applications, when cognitive overload is likely to occur. By identifying the user's previous level of experience, their working memory, the complexity of the interface and the level of distraction imposed by the user's context, a prediction can be made as to when cognitive overload is likely to occur.