Performance Load Exercise Two

Mobile phone display menu

An example of chunking would be the image menu display on touch screen mobile phones. Rather than having large amounts of information displayed everywhere on the screen, they are all nicely organised into their separate categories. This makes it a lot easier for the user to handle and navigate their way through the phones features, it allows for their brains to mentally break down the system into categories. It allows for them to reach a specific desired destination efficiently and effectively. By chunking the information into different categories it encourages the user to develop easier ways to remember where certain things are, rather than trying to remember all the information in one large group.

 

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Electric toothbrush

An electric toothbrush is a device that makes brushing our teeth a lot easier and less time consuming. By having the motorised head, it effectively means that our arms/hands are doing less work, which in turn reduces our performance load.

 

 http://www.huntingtonswa.org.au/image.php?file=/art/rta/electric-toothbrush-fb.jpg&width=325&height=325

 

Car steering wheel

Majority of new cars now come with controls on their steering wheels. Our performance load is significantly reduced by having the controls at our finger tips; we can make changes to the radio station without even lifting our hands off the wheel or looking away from the road. By making this task effectively a lot easier, it allows for us to reduce cognitive and kinematic load.

 http://image.made-in-china.com/2f0j00ZvAQztOREDqm/Steering-Wheel-Bluetooth-Car-MP3-Player-BT-168D-.jpg

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Importance of Psychology

I believe that psychology is a very important element to effective design. The study of psychology allows for researches to go in depth and understand what and why people like and dislike certain things. To create an effective design and/or product, you have to understand your audience, which effectively means you need to understand the human race and why they act the way they do. Psychology has allowed for designers to understand the qualities and desires of our society and what we want from them. They have found out things such as the colour red is one of the most visually pleasing and eye catching colours to the human eye, hence why most fast food chains are designed around the colour red. The study of psychology is necessary for design because it allows for designers to better understand their audience and allows for them to create the products that we want and ways to make the appealing to us.

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Chunking

Chunking refers to organising or grouping separate pieces of information together. It is the configuration of smaller units of information into large coordinated units (2007).  Chunking is an important aspect in design, it helps to eliminate a number of factors in a product that are unnecessary or will become confusing to a consumer. To use the chunking technique, all you have to do is to break the information into smaller, meaningful groups of chunks (2007). Keep in mind that it is easier to remember several short lists rather than one long one. This then makes it easier for consumers to navigate their way through certain elements and eliminates pointless pieces of information that may lead to them becoming confused or lost.

You can remember the information easier by remembering the groups as opposed to each piece of information separately. The types of groups can also act as a cue to help you remember what is in each group.

There are several ways to chunk information. Grouping is when you organise information into groups arbitrarily. For example if you have to remember a ten digit number, you can group it into five sets of two digit numbers. Another way of chunking information is by finding patterns; you can remember the pattern rather than a list of separate pieces of information. You can also organise the information based on its meaning (2010).

The technique you use to chunk will depend on the information you are chunking. Chunking allows for us to navigate our way through design techniques more easily and also allows us to develop patterns and techniques in our mind that make communication in our lives far easier. (2010)

 

 References:

(2007). “Chunking Technique.” from http://www.successfulaging.ca/programs/memory/26.html.

(2010). “Chunking.” from http://www.skillstoolbox.com/career-and-education-skills/learning-skills/effective-learning-strategies/chunking/.

 

 

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Performance Load

The greater the effort to accomplish a task, the less likely the task will be done successfully. Performance load is determined by the degree of mental and physical activity required to achieve a goal. If the performance load is high, performance time and errors increase, and the probability of accomplishing the goal decreases (W. Lidwell 2003).

 

Performance load consists of two types, cognitive load and kinematic load. Kinematic load is the branch of mechanics that studies the motion of a body or a system of bodies without consideration given to its mass or the forces acting on it (Farlex). It is the degree of physical activity, number of steps of movement, or amount of force required to accomplish a goal (W. Lidwell 2003). The general strategies for reducing kinematic load include reducing the number of steps required to complete tasks and minimizing the range of motion and travel distances.

 

Cognitive load theory is an internationally well-known and widespread theory, which has been confirmed in numerous studies (Bannert 2001).  Cognitive load theory is one of the most important theories in educational psychology, a highly effective guide for the design of multimedia and other learning materials (Jan L. Plass 2010). The term is commonly used in the field of education to describe the amount of work imposed on working memory (Chaudhry). The objective of cognitive load theory is to predict learning outcomes by taking into consideration the capabilities and limitations of the human cognitive architecture (Jan L. Plass 2010). The theory can be applied to a broad range of learning environments because it links the design characteristics of learning materials to principles of human information processing (Jan L. Plass 2010).  The general strategies for reducing cognitive load include minimizing visual noise, chunking information that must be remembered, using memory aids to assist in recall and problem solving (W. Lidwell 2003).

 

 References:

Bannert, M. (2001). Managing coginitve load – Recent trends in cognitve load theory, University of Koblanz – Landau.

Chaudhry, M. “What is coginitive load theory?”. from http://matchaudhry.hubpages.com/hub/What-is-Cognitive-Load-Theory.

Farlex. from http://www.thefreedictionary.com/kinematics.

Jan L. Plass, R. M., Ronald Brunken (2010). Cognitive Load Theory: Theory and Applications, Cambridge University Press.

W. Lidwell, K. H., J. Butler (2003). Performance Load. Massachusetts.

 

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