by allowing space for selection
while minimizing the chance
that a voter’s finger inadvertently
rolls outside the button area. This
allows the voter’s finger to roll up,
down, left, or right upon selecting
the button while providing ample
space between the text and the
top or bottom of the surrounding
buttons. Once a selection is made,
a checkmark appears beside the
user’s selection, providing a visual
confirmation of the selection
(Figure 5b). If checkboxes must
be used, we recommend design
option 2. Both the checkbox and
text are vertically centered and
left-justified (Figure 5c).
3. Everett, S. P. The usability of electronic voting
machines and how votes can be changed without
detection. Doctoral Dissertation, Rice University,
2007.
4. Doyle, P. Judges rule Franken winner; Coleman
to appeal. April 5, 2009; http://www.startribune.
com/politics/national/senate/ 42932907.html
5. Sesto, M., Irwin, C., Chen, K., Amrish, C., and
Douglas, W. Effect of touch screen button size and
spacing on touch characteristics of users with and
without disabilities. The Journal of Human Factors
and Ergonomics Society 54, 3 (2012), 425-436.
Implications
Electronic ballot design is a subset
of user interface design, and like
any other type of interface design,
design principles and usability
testing are essential for providing
voters with effective and efficient
systems. The EAC provides a guide
for designing electronic ballots
for DRE systems; however, the
guide does not include detailed
recommendations for the lay-
out of controls, related text, and
objects with which a voter must
interact. Our research supports
the hypothesis that placement of
text affects how users interact
with an electronic voting system.
Therefore, as in West Virginia,
poor placement of text could
potentially leave voters vulnerable
to unintentional selections of can-
didates. Prior research has shown
that nearly half of voters do not
notice such anomalies, which may
affect the outcome of an election
[ 2, 3]. Subsequently, the results
of this research suggest that in
addition to the design recom-
mendations provided by the EAC,
recommendations are needed that
focus on the placement of controls
and related text and objects, as
they may influence how voters
interact with the electronic bal-
lot interface presented to them.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
Juan E. Gilbert is the IDEaS
Professor and chair of the
Human-Centered Computing
Division in the School of
Computing at Clemson University.
He is the principal investigator on
the U.S. Election Assistance Commission
Accessible Voting Technology Initiative and the
lead for the Research for Alliance for Accessible
Voting (RAAV).
Aqueasha M. Martin is a Ph.D.
candidate in the School of
Computing at Clemson University.
Her research interests include
human-computer interaction,
health informatics, and informa-
tion retrieval. She is interested in
the ways that technology can be designed and
used to promote and inform healthy living.
Gregory Rogers is a lead ETL
developer for Chevron. In this
position, he designs, builds, tests,
and maintains databases. He
graduated from Auburn University
with a master’s degree in comput-
er science and a bachelor’s
degree in software engineering. His interests
include spoken language systems, usability, multi-
modal interfaces, human-computer interaction, and
databases. Jerome McClendon is a Ph.D. candidate in the School of Computing at Clemson University, where he is a member of the Cyber Innovations Lab. He received a B. S. and M.S. in com- puter science from Auburn University. His interests include spoken-language systems, machine learning, and natural language processing.
Joshua Ekandem is pursuing a
Ph.D. in human-centered comput-
ing in the School of Computing at
Clemson University. Joshua’s
research interests include the
design and development of natu-
ral user interfaces, especially in
automotive and mobile contexts. He is interested in
achieving natural user interaction through multi-
modal interfaces and culturally situated design
frameworks.
Acknowledgements
This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Election Assistance
Commission (EAC). Opinions or points
of view expressed in this document are
those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official position of, or
a position that is endorsed by, EAC or
the Federal government.
This material is based in part
upon work supported by the National
Science Foundation under Grant
Numbers IIS-0738175. Any opinions,
findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are
those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National
Science Foundation.
ENDNOTES:
1. U.S. Election Assistance Commission. Effective
Designs for the Administration of Federal Elections.
U. S. Election Assistance Commission, Washington,
DC, 2007.
2. Campbell, B. A. and Byrne, M.D. Now do voters
notice review screen anomalies? A look at voting
system usability. Proc. of the 2009 Electronic Voting
Technology Workshop/ Workshop on Trustworthy
Elections (EVT/WOTE ‘09).
November + December 2012
DOI: 10.1145/2377783.2377792
© 2012 ACM 1072-5520/12/11 $15.00