Eyetracking Web Usability

Eyetracking Web Usability

Released December 2009
Publisher(s): New Riders
ISBN: None

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Book description

Eyetracking Web Usability is based on one of the largest studies of eyetracking usability in existence. Best-selling author Jakob Nielsen and coauthor Kara Pernice used rigorous usability methodology and eyetracking technology to analyze 1.5 million instances where users look at Web sites to understand how the human eyes interact with design. Their findings will help designers, software developers, writers, editors, product managers, and advertisers understand what people see or don’t see, when they look, and why.

With their comprehensive three-year study, the authors confirmed many known Web design conventions and the book provides additional insights on those standards. They also discovered important new user behaviors that are revealed here for the first time. Using compelling eye gaze plots and heat maps, Nielsen and Pernice guide the reader through hundreds of examples of eye movements, demonstrating why some designs work and others don’t. They also provide valuable advice for page layout, navigation menus, site elements, image selection, and advertising. This book is essential reading for anyone who is serious about doing business on the Web.

Table of contents

  1. Eyetracking Web Usability
    1. Acclaim for Eyetracking Web Usability
    2. Acknowledgments
    3. About the Authors
    4. Preface
      1. Eyetracking, Not All Usability
      2. Supplementary Reports
      3. What This Book Doesn’t Cover
    5. 1. Eyetracking and the Eye
        1. How Modern Eyetracking Works
        2. Foveal Vision vs. Peripheral Vision
          1. Fixations and Saccades
          2. Why Do Users Not See Something?
        3. The Mind–Eye Hypothesis
        4. Are Looks Good or Bad?
        5. Visualizing Eyetracking Results
          1. Viewing the Heat Maps and Gaze Plots in This Book
        6. Tasks Determine Looks
        7. Other Uses of Eyetracking
          1. Eyetrackers as Input Devices
    6. 2. Our Eyetracking Research
        1. Data Collected
          1. Study Participants
          2. Qualitative and Quantitative Sessions
        2. Test Sessions
          1. Session Logistics
          2. Web Sites and Test Tasks
            1. Quantitative Tasks
            2. Qualitative Tasks
          3. Measures
            1. Subjective Satisfaction
            2. Time
            3. Success
            4. Errors
            5. Miscues
        3. Why Many Eyetracking Studies Are Bogus
          1. Representative Users
          2. Realistic Task Performance
          3. Wide Variety of the Web Sites and Tasks
          4. Weigh the Evidence
        4. Cost of Eyetracking Research
          1. Overall Study Costs
          2. Recruiting Costs
          3. Lost Eyetracking and Recorded Data Costs
          4. Eyetracking-Related Costs
        5. Equipment
    7. 3. Page Layout
        1. How Do People Look at a Page?
          1. Users Looking for News
          2. Users Looking to Buy
          3. Users Buying a Specific Item
          4. Users Doing a Very Specific Task
          5. Web Design Standards That Users Look For
        2. Organization of Pages
          1. Light Pages Encourage Looking
          2. Content Placement and Visual Indicators
          3. Use Priority Spots
            1. Unclear Priority Spots Leave Users Out in Left Field
            2. Priority Spots and Users’ Tasks
            3. Census Site Makes Little Sense to Users
            4. Plotting Priority Areas on a Page
          4. Allocate Screen Real Estate Wisely
          5. The Most Important Elements Should Stand Out
          6. The Price of Miscues
          7. Using Eyetracking to Improve Page Layout
    8. 4. Navigation
        1. Menus and Information Architecture
          1. Global Navigation
          2. Consistent, Persistent, and Simple Navigation
          3. Subpar Subnavigation
          4. Vanishing Navigation
          5. How Information Architecture Can Alienate Users
          6. Branding and Marketing in Menus Confuses People
          7. Utility Navigation
        2. Navigational Elements
          1. Links and Headings
            1. Use Information-Bearing Words
          2. Buttons
            1. Looking Clickable
            2. Buttons That Look like Links
            3. Links That Look like Buttons
            4. Faux Buttons
          3. Breadcrumbs
          4. Search Front-End
    9. 5. Fundamental Web Design Elements
        1. On the Homepage
          1. Login
          2. Privacy Policy
          3. Contact
          4. Language Selectors
        2. Logos and Tag Lines
        3. Shopping Carts
          1. When to Feature Exposed Shopping Carts
        4. Forms, Fields, and Applications
          1. Grouping Sections and Placing Field Labels
            1. Comparing the Usability of Three Forms
            2. How the Forms Scored with Users
          2. Don’t Break Up Phone Number Fields
          3. Short Forms Make for Easy Scanning
          4. Avoid Prompt Text in Fields (At Least for Now)
          5. Guidelines for Reducing Fixations in Forms
    10. 6. Images
        1. What Does and Doesn’t Draw Attention to an Image
        2. Images as Obstacles
          1. Omit Filler Images
        3. Attributes That Draw Attention
          1. Contrast, Quality, and Detail
          2. Motivation and Expectations Can Help Even Bad Images Get Looks
            1. Icons
            2. The Impact of Background
          3. Originality
          4. Relationship to Content
            1. Exciting Images Related to Content
            2. Unexciting Images Related to Content
          5. Magnetic Elements
            1. Faces
            2. People
            3. Attractive and Real-Looking People
            4. Gender Differences in How People Look at People
            5. Human Bodies and Sexual Body Parts
            6. Nonhuman Bodies
            7. Nonsexual Body Parts
            8. Objects of Attention
            9. Delicious-Looking Food
          6. Informational Images
            1. Instructional Images Shouldn’t Leave Users Tied in Knots
            2. Maps
          7. Images That Resemble Advertisements
          8. Cartoons and Illustrations
          9. Images in E-commerce
            1. Navigational Images in E-commerce
            2. Display Value-Ad with Product Images
          10. Moving Images
            1. Animated Progress Indicators
            2. Whimsical Progress Indicators
            3. Distracting Animation
            4. Animation Controls
            5. TV and Movies
            6. The Evolving Web User
    11. 7. Advertisements
        1. It’s a Jungle Out There
        2. When People Look at Ads
          1. Doing Tasks vs. Browsing
            1. People Doing E-commerce Tasks
        3. How Different Types of Ads Fare with Users
        4. The Impact of Ad Placement
          1. Ad Relativity and Competition in User Interfaces
          2. Banner Blindness
        5. Text (Sponsored Link) Ads
          1. Why People Look at Sponsored Links on SERPs
          2. Sponsored Links on Other Pages
          3. Sponsored Links and Hot Potato Behavior
        6. Do Graphics Belong in Web Advertising?
        7. Internal Promotions: Match the Site’s Style
          1. Assess Your Promotion for Lookability
        8. External Ads: What Works
          1. Large, Readable Graphical Text Alone or Separate from Images
          2. Magnetic or Thrilling Graphical Properties
            1. Smiling Faces
            2. Skin
            3. User Interface Elements
          3. Animated Ads
    12. 8. User Viewing Behaviors on the Web
        1. Exhaustive Review vs. Necessary or Desired Review
          1. Exhaustive Review Can Be Downright Exhausting
          2. Bad Record for Some Baseball Sites
          3. What Happens When Information Is Too Complicated
        2. Momentum Behavior
        3. Logging
        4. Selective Disregard
        5. Post-click Behavior
          1. Post-click Verification
          2. Post-click Looks
        6. Perpetual Viewing
          1. Impatient Looking
          2. Residual Looks
        7. Eyetracking Reveals Another Level of User Behaviors
    13. Appendix
        1. How Much People Look at Basic Web Interface Elements
    14. Glossary

Product information

  • Title: Eyetracking Web Usability
  • Author(s):
  • Release date: December 2009
  • Publisher(s): New Riders
  • ISBN: None