Two techniques are described which allow people with certain physical disabilities access to the graphical user interface of a computer using only a headpointer and head gestures. The switchless selection techniques both begin with the user initially pausing within a specific region to indicate the location of the selection. The experiments performed for the current research investigated the pause time and pause region parameters of the techniques.

Four subjects performed a discrete target selection task using two switchless selection techniques:​ a pause followed by a downwards nod gesture, and a single pause time. Dependent measures were misselections (nod errors, pause errors) and extra cursor locks (nod locks). The data was analyzed using ANOVA, and significance tests were performed at a 90% confidence level. Varying the pause time had a significant main effect in all cases. Varying the pause region size had a significant main effect only on pause errors.