How Humans (almost) Universally Perceive

Chapter 1

Part 1: Perception Principles

When designing for an audience, it is important to figure out what makes people alike.
SELECTIVE ATTENTION:
-an important principle of cognitive psychology that applies to information design.
-the mind only captures what it chooses
-in order to produce an effective design that humans will respond to, a designer must create
and arrange the information in line with inherent human behavior.

Most humans will recognize these following characteristics and expect them to mean
something...
-patterns
-interruptions in a pattern
-difference between bigger, bolder, brighter and smaller, lighter, duller
-order and the lack of it
Anything that lacks order in visual display tends to make us uncomfortable. So we mentally
group individual parts to form a whole.

GESTALT PRINCIPLES OF PERCEPTION:

Principles about how parts relate to a whole come from the movement of psychology called
Gestalt, meaning "form" in German.

The Gestalt Principle of Similarity:

-Make equal elements look equal
-Emphasize similarities and differences with your design (typeface, style, size, color)

The Principle of Size Hierarchy:

-viewers understand bigger elements as more important than smaller elements,
which imply less importance
The Principle of Emphasis:
-when people see bold type, they recognize its emphasis. By boldfacing everything
the purpose will be defeated.
The Principle of Hierarchy:
-arrange information and photographs from the most important to the least
The Principle of Alignment:
-align related elements to emphasize their relationship and contrast with other
elements
-adherence to a grid gives projects a sense of order and unity. Pages designed
without a grid draw the eye away from the content to the chaos.
The Gestalt Principle of Proximity:
-Group related things- we expect elements that are close in space to be more related
than those further away

The Gestalt Principle of Figure/Ground:

-Make the content stand out from the background; never ask the audience to work at
telling the two apart

The Principle of Balance and Empty Space:

-Leave just enough space between the elements to frame them, but not so much to
distract from them.

** Every information design piece needs a focal point, an emphasis, and an obvious place
for the reader to start.

The Gestalt Principle of Pragnanz:

Simplify (appropriately) and give context
Content should begin where the audience's knowledge leaves off

The Gestalt Principle of Common Fate:

Viewers notice direction
We group lines and shapes that seem to be heading in the same direction

The Gestalt Principles of Closure and Good Continuation:

Viewers fill in visual gaps
Continuation-like elements (ex: thick bar at the top of every page in a publication,
matching menu and bar logo in a website) can help unify projects.

Instilling a sense of proportion and balance: 'Golden' layout tips

-Striving for a pleasing form can enhance the information gathering experience for the
audience

What is pleasing?

THE GOLDEN MEAN:

-about a 0.618 (2:3) ratio.
-Applying this ration to layout design may increase the pleasure of viewing according to
early architects who used this proportion in their work.

The Fibonacci sequence:

-number series found by a thirteenth century mathematician
-each number comes from adding the two numbers before it: 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8 13, 21, 34,
55.
-when dividing two numbers next to each other, you get either 1.618 or .618 (golden mean)

The rule of thirds:

-based on the 2:3 proportion
-divides a space equally into nine rectangles-three rows of three columns