Supporting collaborative work using interactive tabletop

We investigate the usability of an interactive tabletop application in the context of support for collaborative work. We designed two empirical studies to examine the usability features and associated emotional attitudes of the tabletop mind map applications in comparison with the conventional paper-and-pen approach. Our results clearly indicate that the combination of a tabletop and personal tablets support and encourage multiple people working collaboratively. Furthermore, we found that the tabletop condition significantly encourages participants to produce more ideas. The comparison of the associated emotional attitudes indicates that the interactive tabletop facilitates the active involvement of participants in the group decision making significantly more than the use of the paper-and-pen approach.