How emotional user interface design can increase online shop sales

E-Commerce is growing rapidly, as is the competition among online market. This thesis focuses on improving online sales with emotional user interface design of online shops. A survey conducted in this study explored the features that are important for users (e.g. search, filter, sort), and it also found some possible reasons that make users abandon and leave the online shop. The design presented in this thesis was made based on the results summarized from a design review of 27 popular online shops across the world. Finally, the thesis suggests design guidelines for online shops, and reports a user test to validate the guidelines

Space-based and feature-based attentional selection in perception and working memory

In order to manage the high amount of sensory input we experience, attention processes enable the selective prioritization of goal-relevant information over irrelevant distractions. Two fundamental ways in which this is accomplished is by focusing attention at particular locations in the environment (spatial attention) or by focusing on specific forms of information (feature-based attention). Despite many decades of research examining these mechanisms, however, they have been seldom directly compared particularly in relation to their underlying neural mechanisms. In this thesis, the neural correlates of spatial and feature-based attentional selection for perception and working memory maintenance processes are contrasted. Event-related potential (ERP) components from electroencephalography (EEG) recordings are used as markers of such processes. The N2pc component is used to measure lateralised attentional selection to targets defined by one or a combination of spatial locations and features in perceptual tasks, whilst the CDA component is used to measure the active maintenance of target objects/locations in working memory tasks. In total, this thesis contains three lines of investigation. The first line compares these ERP components for attentional selection to targets defined by spatial locations and features and reveals that in many contexts, spatial attention is processed similarly to featural attention with a few notable exceptions (Chapter 2). The second line of enquiry examines how spatial configural information affects feature-based attentional selection when it is a critical component for successful goal-directed search, revealing that such information can guide attentional selection for some feature dimensions (Chapter 3). Finally, the third line of enquiry compares how spatial and feature-based attention influences visual perceptual and post-perceptual working memory processes (Chapters 4 and 5). This investigation lead to the observations that spatial attentional templates are quicker to guide attention when there is no SOA between the cue and target display onset, and that the two types of attention have similar working memory capacity limitations These findings culminate to provide one of the first direct comparisons of the neural correlates of attention to spatially or featurally-defined information, thereby expanding the current understanding of how spatial/feature-based attention operates. By measuring real-time event-related responses during these task contexts, the present thesis highlights the independent nature of spatial and feature-based attention and their qualitative similarities, but also how they interact upon one another under some circumstances. The findings aid the literature by shedding light on the argument perceptual and post-perceptual processes involved in spatial attention are qualitatively different from featural attention processes

What Makes an Image Memorable? Effects of Encoding on the Mechanism of Recognition

Memory is undoubtedly one of the most important processes of human cognition. A long line of research suggests that recognition relies on the assessment of two explicit memory phenomena: familiarity and recollection. Researchers who support the Dual Process Signal Detection (DPSD) model of recognition memory link the FN400 component (a negative ERP deflection peaking around 400 ms at frontal electrodes) with familiarity; however, it is currently unclear whether the FN400 reflects familiarity or implicit memory. Three event-related potentials (ERP) studies were conducted to determine whether implicit memory plays a role in setting up encoding strategies, and how these encoding strategies influence recognition. Experiment 1 consisted of two phases; an encoding/study phase and recognition/test phase. During the encoding phase, participants viewed pictures of common objects and later during a recognition test phase they made remembered/not-remembered judgments about previously seen (old) pictures and new pictures. ERP analysis of the encoding phase compared subsequently-remembered and subsequently-not-remembered stimuli and revealed marginally significant subsequent memory effects for the FN400 and LPC components. Because participants first saw the pictures during the encoding phase, the FN400 effect during this phase suggested that it was driven by conceptual fluency. Additionally, the fluency ERP (a positive ERP deflection during the time window ~200 - 400 ms) during the encoding phase significantly distinguished subsequently-remembered stimuli from subsequently-not-remembered stimuli, indicating that processing during encoding determined the stimuli to-be-remembered during the recognition test. During the recognition test, the FN400 component correlated with the behavioral indicators of recollection and appeared to benefit from repetition. Experiment 2 was similar to Experiment 1 except that participants saw meaningless novel stimuli (fractals). ERP results from recognition indicate that the FN400 effect did not capture repetition-based familiarity, however, the fluency ERP appeared to gain from the repetition of the stimuli. These results suggest that the FN400 potentials were driven by conceptual implicit memory during encoding, whereas during recognition, the behavioural indicators of recognition linked with the perceptual implicit memory, suggesting that explicit memory is not the only source of familiarity and the neural correlates of perceptual (fluency ERP) and conceptual (the FN400 component) implicit memory can influence decisions made by explicit memory. Experiment 3 manipulated perceptual fluency, conceptual fluency, and repetition-driven familiarity. Participants viewed primed and unprimed, blurred and clear images of common objects that were presented once, twice or three times. Based on recognition performance, ERPs were back-sorted into their corresponding conditions. Fluency and FN400 components correlated with the behavioral indicators of recognition. Additionally, a conceptual implicit priming effect was significant over anterior and right frontal electrodes and perceptual implicit priming was significant at the occipital electrodes. Conclusion: Collectively, the behavioural and ERP results add support the idea that the FN400 is “multiply determined” and may reflect familiarity (explicit memory driven) or conceptual fluency (implicit memory) depending on the task and stimulus, revealing that performance on recognition is not explicit memory driven. The Discrepancy Attribution Hypothesis may provide a better understanding of the heuristics of familiarity, however, further research is needed to better examine the processes that underlie recognition

Space-based and feature-based attentional selection in perception and working memory

In order to manage the high amount of sensory input we experience, attention processes enable the selective prioritization of goal-relevant information over irrelevant distractions. Two fundamental ways in which this is accomplished is by focusing attention at particular locations in the environment (spatial attention) or by focusing on specific forms of information (feature-based attention). Despite many decades of research examining these mechanisms, however, they have been seldom directly compared particularly in relation to their underlying neural mechanisms. In this thesis, the neural correlates of spatial and feature-based attentional selection for perception and working memory maintenance processes are contrasted. Event-related potential (ERP) components from electroencephalography (EEG) recordings are used as markers of such processes. The N2pc component is used to measure lateralised attentional selection to targets defined by one or a combination of spatial locations and features in perceptual tasks, whilst the CDA component is used to measure the active maintenance of target objects/locations in working memory tasks. In total, this thesis contains three lines of investigation. The first line compares these ERP components for attentional selection to targets defined by spatial locations and features and reveals that in many contexts, spatial attention is processed similarly to featural attention with a few notable exceptions (Chapter 2). The second line of enquiry examines how spatial configural information affects feature-based attentional selection when it is a critical component for successful goal-directed search, revealing that such information can guide attentional selection for some feature dimensions (Chapter 3). Finally, the third line of enquiry compares how spatial and feature-based attention influences visual perceptual and post-perceptual working memory processes (Chapters 4 and 5). This investigation lead to the observations that spatial attentional templates are quicker to guide attention when there is no SOA between the cue and target display onset, and that the two types of attention have similar working memory capacity limitations These findings culminate to provide one of the first direct comparisons of the neural correlates of attention to spatially or featurally-defined information, thereby expanding the current understanding of how spatial/feature-based attention operates. By measuring real-time event-related responses during these task contexts, the present thesis highlights the independent nature of spatial and feature-based attention and their qualitative similarities, but also how they interact upon one another under some circumstances. The findings aid the literature by shedding light on the argument perceptual and post-perceptual processes involved in spatial attention are qualitatively different from featural attention processes

The interplay between attention, working memory, and linked neural signatures in visual tracking and inhibition

The aims of this thesis began with investigating whether inattentional blindness was associated with a propensity for lower sensitivity to semantic violations in image textures. Inattentional blindness has recently been investigated through methods such as manipulation of low-level image statistics in artificial textures. However, work in this thesis aimed to transition such research into more natural contexts. Whilst a variety of methods were explored, results specifically related to inattentional blindness and working memory capacity remained inconclusive. Therefore, work in this thesis moved from investigating differences across inattentional blindness groups to how potential strategies of object tracking and relationships to working memory capacity can influence tracking performance. Results from the first half of this thesis provide novel insights into methods that can help to investigate sensitivity to distractors in a naturalistic setting, with both behavioural and neural data. This shift away from investigating inattentional blindness to patterns of tracking across working memory capacity also coincided with a shift to linear mixed effects modelling. This allowed the thesis to remove any artificial grouping through median scores of capacities, and instead focus more on sensitivity across the spectrum. Over five tracking studies, a number of findings suggest of differences across working memory capacity can compensate in performance for such capacity limitations. Findings also suggest that participants, regardless of capacity, employ a post-probe approximation estimation when tracking targets over a trial gap, as opposed to active tracking. Results from the tracking studies emphasise the differing approaches that individuals with varying working memory employ when tracking multiple and single objects