Influence of Viewing Field on Zoom Levels in Pedestrian Orientation Task Using Smartphones

Psychological findings indicate that the scale of human perception has implications on optimal map design. According to the map-based orientation in the real environment, this viewing scale depends on the visual field and is graphically reproduced using zoom levels, which significantly influences the map display area on smartphones. However, it is still unclear how to determine these zoom levels in the pedestrian navigation application. The purpose of this article is to adapt the map display area to the location-related viewing field using a corresponding zoom level. This optimal map display area should make it easier for the pedestrians’ self-location and navigational decisions. The results of the experiments have shown that there was a close relationship between the viewing field and the zoom level on the smartphone. However, if the first decision point of changing direction was in the viewing field, the distance between the viewpoint (You-Are-Here point) and this decision point influenced the zoom level. Otherwise, this distance did not have any influence on the zoom level. In this case, the distance between the viewpoint and the local landmarks determined the zoom level.