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Re: Re-order page content

for

From: Chagnon | PubCom
Date: Jun 3, 2017 5:31PM

Warning: this is a detailed comment to John's detailed comments and citations.

Quote: Citations please, this sounds like bunk to me.

Hm. That's just plain insulting to those of us who have studied this subject.

John, just because you haven't studied human behavior and design doesn't mean this is bunk or that the scientific research doesn't exist or that no one else in the world has studied it.

It just shows that you haven't studied it.

I'm away from my office for a few more weeks so I can't grab books from my research library nor delve into my file cabinet archives or even tap into the digital versions on my office server.

But one of today's best sources of information on behavioral research for design is Dr. Susan Weinschenk www.theteamw.com. Her excellent books are required reading for many in the design and marketing fields, including for the classes I taught at my college:

"100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People" https://www.amazon.com/Things-Designer-People-Voices-Matter/dp/0321767535

"100 MORE Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People" https://www.amazon.com/Things-Designer-People-Voices-Matter/dp/0134196031

"Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click" https://www.amazon.com/Neuro-Web-Design-Makes-Click/dp/0321603605

"How to Get People to Do Stuff: Master the art and science of persuasion and motivation" https://www.amazon.com/How-Get-People-Stuff-persuasion/dp/0321884507

Dr. Weinschenk has the citations to the research studies going back to the early 20th century. If you get a digital version of her work, the cites are usually hyperlinked to the research page, so click away and knock yourself out.


Quote: Second, I know of at least 1 immensely respected web-usability researcher who has been researching these questions for almost 2 decades now, Jakob Neilson / The Neilson Norman Group, and their scientific method of eye-gaze tracking...

Well we agree on one thing, John. Nielsen is a respected researcher. Have also been reading his material for decades. He's done a lot of good work for the communications industries. https://www.nngroup.com/

However, Nielsen researches only one part of the topic: eye tracking only shows where someone's eyes have landed on a webpage, printed page or wherever. The 2 other parts are:
1) When and where did the reader's brain kick in and start recognizing the content and comprehending it?
2) How did the user respond to the content, and how well was he/she able to recall it?

That's the behavior part that Nielsen usually leaves out of his research. But Weinschenk focuses on that and believes (rightly I think) that eye tracking metrics aren't sufficient.

RE: your comment about Nielsen's "F" eye movement pattern, it's really just a variation of the long-standing "Z" pattern. From what I can remember of Nielsen's piece on this, I think it has merit only on webpages that have a permanent left-hand navigation. Books, EPUBs, and webpages without a left-hand navigation would more likely be the traditional "Z" pattern because there's nothing at the left edge to draw the eye back to it, especially on a straight horizontal line back to the starting point.

But what's more important about the F/Z eye movement patterns is at what point does the brain start recognizing what the eye has seen. There is a time lag between when the eye sees something versus when comprehension and recognition happen in the brain.

Taking the F/Z example, I'm defining point 1 as the upper left starting point. Point 2 is the upper right pause point that is horizontally across from point 1. And point 3 is either at or near point 1 (in the F pattern) or slightly lower down the page on the left side (in the Z pattern).

Comprehension doesn't begin at point 1.

It generally begins at point 2--the far right side of the F/Z pattern.

And it's point 2 that has a greater impact on the user's behavior. Ads placed in the upper right corner produce greater sales (and therefore cost more to advertisers). Pithy quotes by politicians in the upper right corner stick longer in constituents' minds. Critical notices to students in the upper right corner are more likely to be read and acted upon.

And instructions on filling out a form field are more likely to be comprehended when they're on the right side of the form field, not the left. That was my original statement...but that's for sighted visitors. Those using screen readers are better served with the instructions first, before the form field.

Luckily we have today's technology that can make this work for both sighted users and those using screen readers.

For someone who has spent a career in design, marketing, PR, and advertising, my bosses and clients need results, not eye tracking metrics. They'll judge the design based on how many widgets were sold, or which political candidate was elected, or in academia, how well students were able to find the courses they need and successfully register for them. Or find the campus map and get their butts to the class.

By the way, it was hard to tell in John's post if he thinks Jakob Nielsen invented eye tracking methods. The wording is unclear. The study of eye movement started in the 1800s and I believe one of the first devices to track eye movements was developed by Yarbus in the 1960s.


RE: placement of logos, we agree again John. Logos usually should be on the left side, specifically in the upper left.

But that all depends upon the design of the webpage. Is this a content-rich internal webpage? Then yes.
Is this an opening splash page that's heavy on design and graphical appearance? Then maybe not. The logo's placement depends upon the entire design and content of that webpage.

I believe the placement of the logo on standard internal pages (in the upper left) isn't due to the F/Z eye tracking pattern, but more on what John states later: predictability and user expectations. Users today, now almost 30 years after the first www webpage was developed, are expecting to find the publisher's logo or identification in the upper left corner, just as they expect to find navigation at the top or along the left side.

Those items don't depend heavily on the F/Z eye tracking models. They're conventions just like driving on the right side of the road is the convention in North America, and driving on the left is the contention in the UK and other regions of the world. Neither one is better than the other; what most important is what you're used to doing.

And that's why visitors who use screen readers will find some way to skip all that verbosity at the top and left side of the page. And why sighted users won't comprehend those areas and mentally skip them, even those their eyes see them.

Finally...
We agree, John: Usability suffers when a site fails to meet users' expectations.

And that precept is central for good design for all users.

--Bevi Chagnon

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