Abstract
Earlier studies have focused on the design of signs as the main factor causing errors pushing buttons (open button in place of close button and vice versa) in the elevator. However, in addition to design, other cognitive factors, such as time pressure and eye movements, may cause people to make errors. In this study, we investigated how these factors affect reaction time and error rates of pushing buttons, and compared the effect sizes of each factor. We employed a basic paradigm that is used in attention studies. The signs were presented alone in Experiment 1 and in pairs in Experiment 2. The results of both experiments showed that the eye movements had a stronger effect than types of design, and that time pressure had the least effect. Our findings suggest that the errors can be decreased by keeping eye movements to a minimum.
