Measuring Symbol and Icon Characteristics: Norms for Concreteness, Complexity, Meaningfulness, Familiarity, and Semantic Distance for 239 Symbols

This paper provides rating norms for a set of symbols and icons selected from a wide variety of sources. These ratings enable the effects of symbol characteristics on user performance to be systematically investigated. The symbol characteristics that have been quantified are considered to be of central relevance to symbol usability research and include concreteness, complexity, meaningfulness, familiarity, and semantic distance. The interrelationships between each of these dimensions is examined and the importance of using normative ratings for experimental research is discussed

Image Search Versus Text Search Revisited: A Simple Experiment Using a Kahoot Quiz

acceptedVersio

The language and communication attributes of graphic symbol communication aids – a systematic review and narrative synthesis

Background: Symbol communication aids are used by children with little or no intelligible speech as an Augmentative and Alternative Communication strategy. Graphic symbols are used to help support understanding of language and used in symbol communication aids to support expressive communication. The decision making related to the selection of a symbol communication aid for a child is poorly understood and little is known about what language and communication attributes are considered in this selection. Aim: To identify from the literature the language or communication attributes of graphic symbol communication aids that currently influence AAC practice. Method and Procedure: A search strategy was developed and searches were performed on a range of electronic databases for papers published since 1970. Quality appraisal was carried out using the CCAT tool and papers rated as weak were not included in the review. Results: Eleven studies were included in the review reporting data from 66 participants. Weaknesses were identified in most studies that would limit the validity of the results for application to practice. Included studies investigated aspects of vocabulary organization and design, the process of vocabulary selection, and the choice of the symbol system and encoding method. Two studies also evaluated innovative communication aid attributes. Conclusions: Information from studies reported in the research literature provides a sparse source of information about symbol communication aids from which clinicians, children or family members may make informed decisions

An icon that everyone wants to click on : an empirical study on the relationship between consumer perceptions and mobile game icon successfulness

Mobile games market has been touted as the fastest growing gaming sector in the world. Every day thousands of new mobile games are published to join millions of others on app stores. The competition for top grossing mobile games is fierce, and the way a game is represented greatly contributes to its commercial success. When browsing for mobile games, consumers search for an icon they want to click on. However, most mobile games fail to engage consumers who browse past hundreds of icons on app stores daily. This leads us to the following questions: how do consumers perceive mobile game icons and what are the aesthetic qualities that make an icon successful in the sense that it incites consumers to click? This thesis investigates the relationship between consumer perceptions of mobile game icons and icon successfulness (i.e. consumer overall evaluation of the icon and their willingness to click the icon as well as download and purchase the mobile game). An online survey was constructed for respondents (respondent n = 569) to evaluate 4 randomized icons each from a total set of 68 mobile game icons with a classification of four dominant icon attributes: abstract, concrete, character and text. The evaluation was done by using semantic differential scales of 22 adjective pairs leading into a total of 2276 icon evaluations that form the data of the study (icon evaluation n = 2276). The results indicate that consumers are more likely to give a higher grade to icons and click them as well as download and purchase the mobile game that the icon belongs to, when the icons are perceived beautiful, good, unique, professional, expensive, soft, exciting, strong, relaxed, realistic and quiet. Additionally, adjectives masculine, young, active, colorful, three-dimensional, happy and simple predict a higher grade; adjectives active, two-dimensional, colorless, masculine, happy and young predict clicking; adjectives active, happy, simple and young predict downloading and; adjectives sad, colorless and fast predict purchasing. Furthermore, the study investigated the factorial structure of perceptions towards icons, or in other words, which adjectives are likely to occur together in user evaluation for any given icon. The results show that the following factors can be identified: value, potency, activity, integrity and complexity. This study was one of the first attempts to understand consumer perceptions of mobile game icon successfulness. The results may be helpful for future research as well as to game companies when designing mobile game icons for app stores

Attractive User Interface Elements : Measurement and prediction

The years 2020–2021 mark a time when the global population was encountered by a world-wide pandemic. The lockdown had devastating consequences on many industries and individuals, and the emergence of global economies into the postpandemic recovery has only just begun. However, as people adapted to the pandemic by embracing a mobile lifestyle, industries that employed graphical user interfaces as a means of human-computer interaction saw tremendous growth, exceeding everyone’s expectations despite predictions of a slowdown. One example is the mobile apps and games markets, touted as the fastest growing marketplaces worldwide. At the moment, the impact of the mobile economy is undeniably high, and it does not show signs of stalling. As we look ahead and start the 'return to physical', we can see new mobile habits take shape in our everyday life. Today, people conduct most daily functions via graphical user interfaces, due to the increasing technology-mediated nature of all human praxis, such as socializing, work, education, and entertainment. The interaction is realized on various different platforms, be they on desktop, mobile devices, VR or (smart) TVs. Although user interfaces themselves are not novel, their role is more significant now than anyone could have imagined only a few decades ago. Attractive visual designs in user interfaces have proven to enhance many aspects concerning usability, sense of pleasure and trust, but evaluating aesthetics is challenging due to the subjective nature of user perception. Although several theories and measurement instruments have been developed in order to assess and design pleasing user interfaces, the measures remain scattered. Therefore, the aim of this dissertation is to expand knowledge on how the visual aesthetics of graphical user interfaces can be modelled, evaluated, and assessed. Through four studies, this dissertation provides an overview of the state-of-theart in the literature of measurement instruments of visual aesthetics for graphical user interfaces. The dimensions of aesthetic perception that emerge in the context of user interface elements are also examined and introduced by developing a scale for measuring perceptions. As engaging and intuitive imagery has become one of the most valuable assets in today’s attention economy, the studies also observe individual user perceptions of different demographic groups and their relationships on aesthetic qualities to determine how they predict the success of graphical elements. The publications employ methodology ranging from a systematic literature review to sophisticated, quantitative statistical modelling methods to accurately identify and address each of the described phenomena by standardized means. The findings provided by this dissertation greatly contribute to existing literature on the measurement and prediction of visually pleasing graphical user interfaces both practically and theoretically. Advancing knowledge and guidelines in this fast-paced field requires assessment from a wide perspective, including the observation of prior work, and the adaptation of measures to the modern economy by highlighting user behavior and preferences. This is particularly important in the milieu of the increasingly growing prevalence of graphical user interfaces that will continue shaping our lives in ways unimaginable

Lisbon Symbol Database (LSD): subjective norms for 600 symbols

This article presents subjective rating norms for a new set of 600 symbols, depicting various contents (e.g., transportation, technology, and leisure activities) that can be used by researchers in different fields. Symbols were evaluated for aesthetic appeal, familiarity, visual complexity, concreteness, valence, arousal, and meaningfulness. The normative data were obtained from 388 participants, and no gender differences were found. Descriptive results (means, standard deviations, and confidence intervals) for each symbol in each dimension are presented. Overall, the dimensions were highly correlated. Additionally, participants were asked to briefly describe the meaning of each symbol. The results indicate that the present symbol set is varied, allowing for the selection of exemplars with different levels on the seven examined dimensions. This set of symbols constitutes a tool with potential for research in different areas. The database with all of the symbols is available as supplemental materials.info:eu-repo/semantics/acceptedVersio

The Dilemma of minors’ access to adult content on the Internet: A proposed warnings solution

The Internet can be a dangerous place for children. Because minors have unrestricted access to adult content, a system of warnings targeting minors on the Internet should be developed. The present studies tested icons for such a system and subsequently to examined selected icons in combination with signal words, color, and warning messages. One hundred and ninety three adults and eleven children participated in the first study. Participants rated thirty eight icons created by the researcher for their understandability, carefulness, attention-getting, likelihood of encountering and severity of danger, likelihood of avoidance and familiarity. Familiar icons were found to be rated higher in all, but one (avoidance) variables than unfamiliar icons, abstract icons were rated as communicating more danger than concrete icons, and prohibitive icons were rated higher than non-prohibitive icons. Three hundred and fifty three adults and ten children participated in the second study. In this study, the five most effective icons from Study I (effectiveness was the best linear combination of understandability, carefulness, attention-getting, danger, and avoidance) were paired with signal words (STOP and WARNING) in black and red and warning messages, ranging in severity and explicitness. Results indicated that the signal word STOP was rated higher overall than WARNING, the color red was rated higher than black, and ratings for warning messages increased as the message explicitness and severity increased. A significant four-way icon x color x signal word x warning message interaction was found and interpreted. All other interactions were likewise significant; the color x signal word interaction was interpreted to fill in the gap in the interpretation of the larger interaction. Most of the results were supported in the previous literature findings. However, it was found that for the likelihood of avoidance variable, the most severe message was less effective than the less severe messages for the Crying Baby, Prohibit, and Boy icons. Results and future research directions are discussed

Design standards for icons: The independent role of aesthetics, visual complexity and concreteness in icon design and icon understanding

Icons play an important role in modern interfaces and therefore recent empirical research has focused on enhancing icon processing — that is, icon perception and icon function understanding. However, in existing sets, icons vary simultaneously across different icon characteristics, confusing the contribution of each to icon processing. We developed icon design principles for aesthetics, complexity, and concreteness, and used them to create 64 icons that varied independently along each characteristic. Participants reported the icon function and rated each icon in terms of aesthetics, complexity and concreteness. The manipulated characteristics had independent effects on icon processing, with two exceptions, for which we propose evidence-based solutions. Based on these findings we propose guidelines for designing icons for research purposes

Visual iconic object-oriented programming to advance computer science education and novice programming

Learning how to program a computer is difficult for most people. Computer programming is a cognitively challenging, time consuming, labor intensive, and frustrating endeavor. Years of formal study and training are required to learn a programming language\u27s world of algorithms and data structures. Instructions are coded in advance before the computer demonstrates the desired behavior. Seeing all the programming steps and instruction code is complicated. There exists a tremendous gap between the representations the human brain uses when thinking about a problem and the representations used in programming a computer. Often people are much better at dealing with specific, concrete objects than working with abstract ideas. Concrete and specific programming examples and demonstrations can be very useful. When cleverly chosen and properly used, programming examples and demonstrations help people understand the abstract concepts. Programming by example or demonstration attempts to extend these novel ideas to novice programming