📖100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know about People

people identify object be reorganizing patterns

The visual cortex is more active when we’re imagining thing than when we actually perceive it. (p.7)

• (is imagination as real?)

• → We verbalize/visualize thoughts to activate our brain “from outside”

favor 2d elements over 3d ones

people recognize object faster from canonical perspective §5

people tend to not look at edges, so don’t put important information there

many people are color-blind (mostly red-green) §11

• either have a redundancy in indicators (e.g., use line thickness and color) or a color scheme that looks good for color-blind

• sites to check design for color-blindness

  • http://vischeck.com (site is down)

  • http://colorfilter.wickline.org (redirects to https://www.toptal.com/designers/colorfilter)

Colours in Cultures (see Color meaning)

all uppercase is not inherently harder to read

• we also do not recognize words by shapes

if people have trouble reading the font, they will think the task is harder to do.

use font with a large x-height for online viewing, so it appears larger

longer line length are faster to read, but we prefer shorter line length

good number of items to remember is 4 (not 7±2)

• chunk and group information so it is easier to remember

progressing disclosure

• show minimum information initially, but show more and more with each step

• “if you have eto make a trade-off on clicks versus thinking, use more clicks and less thinking.” p.64

load hierarchy

1. cognitive load (hard)

2. visual

3. motor (easy)

mental model: what’s in user’s mind

conceptual model: what product communicates

use stories

The Time Paradox: The New Psychology of Time That Will Change Your Life: Philip Zimbardo, John Boyd

if you must hold attention longer than 7 to 10 minutes, introduce novel information or a break

Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click?: Susan Weinschenk

Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us: Daniel H. Pink

delayed gratification is important to success

Fundamental Attribution Error (personality vs. situation) does not apply to bad situations only. Check for it every time you try to describe any people behavior (good or bad).