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The effect of aesthetically pleasing composition on visual search performance

Published: 16 October 2010 Publication History

Abstract

This paper presents the results of a study on the effect of the aesthetic layout properties of a computer interface on visual search performance. Search performance was measured at three levels of layout aesthetics: high, medium, and low. Two types of performance metric were recorded: response time and number of errors. Performance at the three levels of aesthetics was also compared between two search methods (with or without mouse pointing), and related to preference. The findings of the present study indicate that, regardless of search method used, response time (but not errors) was strongly affected by the aesthetics level. There is also a clear relationship between preference and performance when a composite measurement of aesthetics is used, although this does not seem to be due to the influence of individual aesthetic features. Further study is needed to identify other aesthetic factors that influence task performance, and to establish appropriate design guidelines.

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      cover image ACM Other conferences
      NordiCHI '10: Proceedings of the 6th Nordic Conference on Human-Computer Interaction: Extending Boundaries
      October 2010
      889 pages
      ISBN:9781605589343
      DOI:10.1145/1868914
      Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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      Published: 16 October 2010

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      Author Tags

      1. aesthetics
      2. aesthetics measures
      3. interface layout
      4. task performance

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      • (2024)On Improving the Qualitative Features of the User Interface of Mobile Applications Using Machine Learning Methods2024 47th MIPRO ICT and Electronics Convention (MIPRO)10.1109/MIPRO60963.2024.10569276(205-210)Online publication date: 20-May-2024
      • (2024)Research on the Impact of Mobile Terminal Information Layout on Visual Search-Taking Bookkeeping Application as an ExampleHuman-Centered Design, Operation and Evaluation of Mobile Communications10.1007/978-3-031-60458-4_18(268-281)Online publication date: 1-Jun-2024
      • (2023)Smartphone app aesthetics influence users' experience and performanceFrontiers in Psychology10.3389/fpsyg.2023.111384214Online publication date: 14-Jun-2023
      • (2023)A Quality Model-based Approach for Measuring User Interface Aesthetics with GraceProceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction10.1145/35932247:EICS(1-47)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2023
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      • (2020)Development of measurement instrument for visual qualities of graphical user interface elements (VISQUAL): a test in the context of mobile game iconsUser Modeling and User-Adapted Interaction10.1007/s11257-020-09263-7Online publication date: 17-May-2020
      • (2019)Experimental investigation on the effects of website aesthetics on user performance in different virtual tasksPeerJ10.7717/peerj.65167(e6516)Online publication date: 22-Feb-2019
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