Comparison of user interfaces for measuring the matrix sentence test on a smartphone.

Objective: Smartphone-based self-testing could facilitate large-scale data collection and remote diagnostics. For this purpose, the matrix sentence test (MST) is an ideal candidate due to its repeatability and accuracy. In clinical practice, the MST requires professional audiological equipment and supervision, which is infeasible for smartphone-based self-testing. Therefore, it is crucial to investigate the feasibility of self-administering the MST on smartphones, including the development of an appropriate user interface for the small screen size.

Design: We compared the traditional closed matrix user interface (10 × 5 matrix) to three alternative, newly-developed interfaces (slide, type, wheel) regarding SRT consistency, user preference, and completion time.

Study sample: We included 15 younger normal hearing and 14 older hearing-impaired participants in our study.

Results: The slide interface is most suitable for mobile implementation, providing consistent and fast SRTs and enabling all participants to perform the tasks effectively. While the traditional matrix interface works well for most participants, some participants experienced difficulties due to its small size on the screen.

Conclusions: We propose the newly-introduced slide interface as a plausible alternative for smartphone screens. This might be more attractive for elderly patients that may exhibit more challenges with dexterity and vision than our test subjects employed here.