Traditional spatial hypertext systems, predominantly limited to two-dimensional (2D) interfaces, offer limited support for addressing long debated inherent problems such as orientation difficulties and navigation in large information spaces. In this context, we present opportunities from interdisciplinary fields such as immersive analytics (IA) and embodied cognition that may mitigate some of these challenges. However, while some research has explored the extension of spatial hypertext to three dimensions, there is a lack of discussion on recent advances in virtual reality technologies and related fields, and their potential impact on immersive spatial hypertext systems. This paper addresses this gap by exploring the integration of immersive technologies into spatial hypertext systems, proposing a novel approach to enhance user engagement and comprehension through three-dimensional (3D) environments and multisensory interaction.

This paper explores the integration of hypertext structures within Virtual Reality (VR) environments, differentiating between two distinct design philosophies: VR as a native framework for 3D embodiment-enabled spaces similar to traditional 2D spatial hypertext, and utilizing hypertext to enhance VR experiences. Focusing on the latter approach, we propose an abstract knowledge layer that bridges typical VR systems and human thinking, thus facilitating the integration of human cognitive capabilities. Finally, we explore ethical implications of VR systems that arise in the presented context and propose hypertext as a paradigm to address some of these concerns.

The paper presents SPORE, a spatial hypertext-oriented recommender system. Integrating spatial hypertext and recommender systems with a structuralist approach to narrative, SPORE seeks to mimic the process of storybreaking that already exists in the creative industries. This more organic, exploratory approach offers a potential “third way” for co-creation with artificial intelligence.

This paper posits that spatially structured concepts can function as a visual representation of knowledge, a notion supported by common methods of eliciting and presenting mental models. Despite an existing gap in understanding the correlation between visual structure and knowledge representation, this study aims to clarify this relationship. To this end, we conducted a study wherein participants rated pairwise relationships between ten concepts on a discrete scale ranging from one to ten. Subsequently, we compared these ratings with weights derived from the distances between concepts in human-generated spatial structures. Our findings unveil a linear relationship between the weights obtained through both methods, indicating that spatial arrangements may systematically reflect and encode knowledge.

This paper considers hypertext in its various forms as a paradigm that has the potential to reduce a number of ethical concerns that come with (generative) AI. Based on a user scenario, the paper points out some ethical issues and explains how they can be addressed by hypertext. To do so, it distinguishes between System 1 (fast automation of simple tasks) and System 2 (critical thinking) tasks. Drawing on existing publications in philosophy, the paper argues that AI systems cannot be moral agents; they cannot be trustworthy or truly intelligent. This breaks with some of the wording, partly used for marketing purposes, that currently makes “artificial intelligence” a hype. The analysis follows the three most important ethical theories: deontology, consequentialism, and virtue ethics. The paper concludes that hypertext, although a niche topic, is already prepared to solve some of the most prominent and urgent ethical issues in AI.

SPORENLP is a recommendation system designed to review scientific literature. It operates on a sub-dataset comprising 15,359 publications, with a total of 117,941,761 pairwise comparisons. This dataset includes both metadata comparisons and text-based similarity aspects obtained using natural language processing (NLP) techniques.Unlike other recommendation systems, SPORENLP does not rely on specific aspect features. Instead, it identifies the top k candidates based on shared keywords and embedding-related similarities between publications, enabling content-based, intuitive, and adjustable recommendations without excluding possible candidates through classification. To provide users with an intuitive interface for interacting with the dataset, we developed a web-based front-end that takes advantage of the principles of spatial hypertext. A qualitative expert evaluation was conducted on the dataset. The dataset creation pipeline and the source code for SPORENLP will be made freely available to the research community, allowing further exploration and improvement of the system.

In personalized interaction between humans and computers, not only computers and personalization algorithms learn about the users: the users also learn about the system’s behavior and adapt their expectations accordingly. Particularly, as users expect systems to support their daily activities, this feedback loop may result in long-term changes in these daily activities and user decisions themselves. This can be observed in activities as different as autonomous driving and social media consumption. In this chapter, we investigate these effects by reviewing and analyzing a wide range of relevant literature.

We are entering a period of unprecedented collaboration between authors and computers, where artificial intelligence in particular seems likely to act increasingly in a co-authoring capacity. Automated or procedural storytelling represents one exciting avenue of research. By entering prompts and parameters into an AI text generator like ChatGPT, authors could leverage an enormous textual corpus to generate a “new” work that appears to have been authored by a human.

This paper proposes an alternative platform, one more reflective of the collaborative and organic creative process. Approached as a tool for augmentation, Mother showcases the potential for spatial hypertext to work alongside the author.

Two years ago the idea of International Teaching and Research in Hypertext (INTR/HT) was introduced. This paper follows up on this idea and further develops new thoughts on this topic, based on the experiences gained from three university courses taught under the umbrella of INTR/HT. We conclude we have envisioned a model for the future of international and interdisciplinary education in hypertext that has the potential to raise the next generation of hypertext researchers through efforts of collaborative teaching and learning activities.

The paper presents SPORE, a Spatial Recommender System. As we enter a period of unprecedented collaboration between authors and computers, where artificial intelligence in particular seems likely to act increasingly in a co-authoring capacity, SPORE offers a different approach to collaboration. More organic and exploratory than other automated or procedural systems, SPORE aims to mimic the process of storybreaking that already exists in the creative industries.

Vladimir Propp (1895–1970) was a Russian folklorist, who identified what he considered the 31 fundamental actions of major characters and their consequences for a story, actions which he called functions. This paper focuses on one specific part of this principle—spheres of action—and considers how they might be explored using SPORE and its underlying infrastructure Mother, a spatial hypertext-based recommender system developed by the authors.

Recommender Systems are omnipresent in our digital life. Most notably, various media platforms guide us in selecting videos, but recommender systems are also used for more serious goals, such as news selection, political orientation and work decisions. As argued in this survey and position article, the paradigm of recommendation-based feeds has changed user behaviour from active decision making to rather passively following recommendations and accepting possibly suboptimal choices that are deemed “good enough”. We provide a historic overview of media selection, discuss assumptions and goals of recommender systems and identify their shortcomings, based on existing literature. Then, the perspective changes to hypertext as a paradigm for structuring information and active decision making. To illustrate the relevance and importance of active decision making, we present a use case in the field of TV or media selection and (as a proof of concept) carried over to another application domain: maintenance in industry. In the discussion section, we focus on categorising these actions on a spectrum of “system-1” (fast and automated) tasks and “system-2” (critical thinking) tasks. Further, we argue how users can profit from tools that combine active (spatial) structuring and categorising with automatic recommendations, for professional tasks as well as private, leisure activities.

Human Factors in Hypertext 2022 (HUMAN'22) is the 5th workshop in this series. It is sponsored by ACM SIGWEB and is associated to the ACM Conference on Hypertext and Social Media 2022 (HT'22), which takes place between June 28th and July 1st in Barcelona, Spain as a hybrid event. HUMAN'22 takes place on June 28th—the conference's workshop day.

After two years of pandemic-caused virtual workshops, HUMAN'22 is organized as a hybrid event, which is in line with the organization of the main conference. We see this as a chance to allow in-presence meetings while providing remote participants the opportunity to get in touch by low registration costs and a reduced carbon footprint. Today's digital media enables us to communicate over distance or even attend larger meetings online and the Corona pandemic has taught us to use these tools in our daily life. This puts a special focus on the role of hypertext in our communication and information exchange demands, in particular from a human's perspective.

Hypertext systems support users in navigating structured data sets and to find relevant information. Various interaction and visualization concepts aim to give users better insight into the data set, by suggesting queries and visualizing elements of interest in a meaningful way. Ranked lists are very common to show some sort of priority, while spatial layouts often help users to trace relations in the data. Only little research has been done in user studies that systematically show and reason about the differences of such spatial layouts and ranked lists. In this paper we report on a systematic comparison of a spatial visualization versus a ranked list layout. For this purpose, we did an between-subject study with 43 participants. One group performed a task with a system providing semantic visualization in 2D, the other group performed the same task with a ranked list. Both interfaces are very similar and only differ in how suggestions are visualized. The results show that users of the spatial layout finished their task in shorter time and have a tendency towards higher satisfaction. At the same time, they had more interactions with the system. Furthermore we discuss some in-depth data of the test sessions, which show that the visualization influences the users’ behavior.

In this paper, we report on a software demonstrator that utilizes a spatial hypertext UI to support knowledge management in the context of maintenance in industry. To demonstrate the flexibility of that approach, we re-use the software to visualize bibliographic data of the Hypertext conference series.

Associating information by means of linking it is a universal concept of human thinking, and by constructivist means, a possible way of learning through exploring and constructing individual information spaces related to a topic or cross topics. An application, facilitating and externalizing this activity by enabling users to create individual hyperlinks inside the environment of the Web, is a promising way to satisfy this exploratory use of information. The focus on an augmentative approach by lining hypertext's linking paradigm, in conjunction with the Web's vast amount of information, opens up for a broad spectrum of potential use scenarios. The possibilities reflect potential complexities concerning usability and limitations of usage. Therefore, preliminary and iterative evaluations are indispensable for meeting these challenges. We discuss a preliminary evaluation of usability and user behavior of said application by a conducted study based on cross-sectional quasi experimental design, using a controlled test scenario and collected client side data that serves as basis for interpretation on user behavior. Results indicate a strong habituation to document-centric processing and storing of information, and the tendency for transferring this behavior onto the more versatile linking mechanism introduced by the application. We argue for applying additional supportive features, specific for facilitating the reduction of complexity on user-side, and a longer testing period, in order to gain better insight into the possible overcome of habitual patterns concerning the tested use scenario.

This blue sky paper envisions a novel system which promotes emotional closeness through storytelling. Family members, who may be separated, collaboratively build a spatial hypertext of images and text fragments to express and structure their thoughts and memories. The system observes their reactions as well as their media while they work. Live recommendations prompt users in their thinking and storytelling. Family stories are thus collaboratively adapted to more tightly connect the thoughts and emotions of their loved ones.