Evaluation of Pedometer Interfaces for Mobile Apps.

The use of mobile health apps has been on the rise, as they allow people to get their health information more conveniently. Many people are using their mobile health apps to track their health status (KC et al., 2021), but there are known issues with people being unable to use their health apps effectively due to poor design. According to Wildebos et al. (2019), if users are continuously failing to get the information they need, they could develop feelings of insecurity and stop using the app. To mitigate these negative interface design impacts, Universal Design Principles (Story, 1998) and Gestalt's Principle of Perceptual Grouping (Smith-Gratto & Fisher, 1999) could be used to improve the interfaces. In the present study, we evaluated several interfaces of pedometer apps that varied in terms of flexibility (low and high) and three levels of simplicity (simple, intermediate, and complex). Ninety six participants were recruited from MTurk. The participants responded to questions on a survey that require them to extract information from a pedometer interface. After answering the comprehension questions for the specific interface, participants were asked to indicate their perceived ease of use (Brooke, 1996) and the likelihood of utilizing the pedometer app (Pasha & Indrawati, 2020). We found that participants had higher accuracy scores with the interface that was intermediate in terms of simplicity, but they preferred the simple or complex interface design. Results of this study suggest that users may not prefer designs that lead to better task performance and designers will need to balance features that enhance performance versus those that users find to be more attractive or desirable for continued use.

Tillaux Fracture Associated with Adult Ankle Fracture Injury.

Tillaux fractures in adults are rare and, if unrecognized, can lead to ankle fracture healing complications, early progression of arthritis, and limited ankle movement caused by pain and degenerative changes. The Tillaux fracture was first described by Paul Tillaux as an external rotation injury of the ankle, involving an avulsion fracture of the distal anterolateral tibia. This fracture can be easily overlooked on plain radiographs in the adult. A high index of suspicion for this type of fracture pattern along with the use of computed tomographic scanning can help confirm the suspected diagnosis, rule out other tibial injuries, and provide more information on the best course of action. Historically, Tillaux fractures have been more common in adolescents because of the open tibial epiphyseal plate. Once the epiphyseal plate fully closes, skeletal maturity is achieved, thus making it extremely unusual for the anterior tibiofibular ligament to cause an avulsion fragment of the distal anterolateral tibia. Because of how uncommon this type of fracture is in adults, it has rarely been reported in our literature. We reviewed the literature and present a case report of this rare fracture injury.

Peer vs. Self-Grading of Practice Exams: Which Is Better?

Practice exams are a type of deliberate practice that have been shown to improve student course performance. Deliberate practice differs from other types of practice, because it is targeted, mentally challenging, can be repeated, and requires feedback. Providing frequent instructor feedback to students, particularly in large classes, can be prohibitive. A possible solution is to have students grade practice exams using an instructor-generated rubric, receiving points only for completion. Students can either grade their own or a peer's work. We investigated whether peer or self-grading had a differential impact on completion of practice exam assignments, performance on practice exams or course exams, or student grading accuracy. We also investigated whether student characteristics mattered. We found that 90% of students took all practice exams or only missed one and that there was no difference on practice or course exam performance between the peer and self-graders. However, in the peer-grading treatment, students with lower incoming grade point averages and students identified as economically or educationally disadvantaged were less accurate and more lenient graders than other students. As there is no clear benefit of peer grading over self-grading, we suggest that either format can solve the challenge instructors face in giving frequent personalized feedback to many students.