Icon flickering, flicker rate, and color combinations of an icon's symbol/background in visual search performance

The effects of color combinations of an icon's symbol/background and components of flicker and flicker rate on visual search performance on a liquid crystal display screen were investigated with 39 subjects who searched for a target icon in a circular stimulus array (diameter = 20 cm) including one target and 19 distractors. Analysis showed that the icon's symbol/background color significantly affected search time. The search times for icons with black/red and white/blue were significantly shorter than for white/yellow, black/yellow, and black/blue. Flickering of different components of the icon significantly affected the search time. Search time for an icon's border flickering was shorter than for an icon symbol flickering; search for flicker rates of 3 and 5 Hz was shorter than that for 1 Hz. For icon's symbol/background color combinations, search error rate for black/blue was greater than for black/red and white/blue combinations, and the error rate for an icon's border flickering was lower than for an icon's symbol flickering. Interactions affected search time and error rate. Results are applicable to design of graphic user interfaces.     

Effects of display characteristics and individual differences on preferences of VDT icon design

This study explored the effects of display characteristics such as target/background color combination, single/simultaneous presentation, and individual differences by sex, and design specialty on preferences of VDT icon design. The results indicated black targets (black-on-white, black-on-yellow) and black backgrounds (red-on-black, yellow-on-black) were the most popular and white targets (white-on-red, white-on-black) and white backgrounds (blue-on-white, red-on-white) were the second most popular. As for the chromatic color combinations, yellow-on-blue was the most favored. Subjects rated color combinations under single presentation higher than those under simultaneous presentation. Women rated purplish targets and rated purplish and blue backgrounds higher than men. Subjects with design background favored black more either as a target or background, but they favored turquoise less than those without design background.     

Exploring the effects of icon characteristics on user performance: the role of icon concreteness, complexity, and distinctiveness

Because icons, signs, and symbols are now widely used to communicate information, it is essential for system designers to know what makes them easy to use and interpret. The authors report a series of studies that examine characteristics considered central to icon usability. After quantifying the properties of icon concreteness, complexity, and discriminability, the authors assessed each property's effects on user performance when user experience, task demands, and presentation context were systematically varied. Findings indicated that the effects of icon concreteness were primarily associated with the initial grasp of meaning, whereas complexity effects were found to persist longer and to be associated with search efficacy. The effects of icon distinctiveness were complex, but distinctiveness was enhanced by using both semantic and visual contrasts. The implications of these findings for interface design are discussed.     

Effects of flicker rate, complexity, and color combinations of Chinese characters and backgrounds on visual search performance with varying flicker types

This study investigated the effects of number of strokes in Chinese characters, flicker rate, flicker type, and character/background color combination on search performance. 37 participants ages 14 to 18 years were randomly assigned to each flicker-type condition. The search field contained 36 characters arranged in a 6 x 6 matrix. Participants were asked to search for the target characters among the surrounding distractors and count how many target characters were displayed in the search array. Analysis indicated that the character/background color combination significantly affected search times. The color combinations of white/purple and white/green yielded search times greater than those for black/white and black/yellow combinations. A significant effect for flicker type on search time was also identified. Rotating characters facilitated search time, compared with twinkling ones. The number of strokes and the flicker rates also had positive effects on search performances. For flicker rate, the search accuracy for 0.5 Hz was greater than that for 1.0 Hz, and the latter was also greater than that for 2.0 Hz. Results are applicable to web advertisement designs containing dynamic characters, in terms of how to best capture readers' attention by various means of dynamic character presentation.     

3—6岁白、哈尼族与汉族儿童的颜色命名能力的发展

探讨了云南地区白族与哈尼族３—６岁儿童的颜色命名能力发展,并与北京地区汉族同龄儿童作了比较。实验结果表明,不同民族的儿童的颜色命名能力都伴随年龄增长而逐步提高;但汉族儿童的颜色命名能力发展略高于哈尼族与白族同龄儿童。总的来看,儿童对不同颜色正确命名能力的发展有着共同的规律性,即黑、白、红三色较易正确命名,其次是黄、绿、蓝三色较难正确命名,命名正确率最低的颜色是橙与紫。     

Modeling icon search in ACT-R/PM

As the use of graphical user interfaces expands into new areas, icons are becoming an increasingly important aspect of GUIs. Oddly, little research has been done into the costs and benefits associated with using icons. One aspect of icons, icon borders, has been proposed as a means of adding information to icons. An experiment was conducted in which the potential cost in response time of using simple icon borders was investigated. Two models were then constructed in ACT-R/PM to carry out the same icon search task as in the experiment. The results of the modeling effort indicated an area where the design of the experiment could be improved. A second, ‘improved’ experiment was carried out, the results of which suggest areas for further improvement in the ACT-R/PM models.     

Legibility of small icons with color combinations in small displays

The present study explored the effects of figure/ground color combinations on legibility of small icons. This experiment used a 2 (icon size) x 3 (icon hue) x 3 (icon saturation) x 3 (background hue) x 3 (background saturation) x2 (luminance contrast) factorial design. Legibility was investigated by response time of subicons with different factors t hat affect discrimination. 11 undergraduate students from the National Formosa University in Taiwan were recruited to participate in the experiment. Their mean age was 21.8 yr. (SD=3.3). Analysis also showed that Icon Size x Luminance Contrast, Background Hue x Luminance Contrast, and Background Saturation x Luminance Contrast significantly affected response time. The results suggested that the higher Luminance Contrast could promote icon legibility but not the icon chromaticity or background chromaticity.     

Searching for signs, symbols, and icons: effects of time of day, visual complexity, and grouping

Searching for icons, symbols, or signs is an integral part of tasks involving computer or radar displays, head-up displays in aircraft, or attending to road traffic signs. Icons therefore need to be designed to optimize search times, taking into account the factors likely to slow down visual search. Three factors likely to adversely affect visual search were examined: the time of day at which search was carried out, the visual complexity of the icons, and the extent to which information features in the icon were grouped together. The speed with which participants searched icon arrays for a target was slower early in the afternoon, when icons were visually complex and when information features in icons were not grouped together to form a single object. Theories of attention that account for both feature-based and object-based search best explain these findings and are used to form the basis for ways of improving icon design.     

Limitations on the parallel guidance of visual search: color x color and orientation x orientation conjunctions

In visual search for a conjunction it is much more difficult to search for the conjunction of 2 colors or 2 orientations than for Color x Orientation or Color x Shape conjunctions. The result is not limited to particular colors or shapes. Two colors cannot occupy the same spatial location in Color x Color searches. However, Experiments 6 and 7 show that Color x Shape searches remain efficient even if the color and shape are spatially separated. Our guided search model suggests that in searches for Color x Shape, a parallel color module can guide attention toward the correct color, whereas the shape module guides attention toward the correct shape. Together these 2 sources of guidance lead attention to the target. However, if a target is red and green among red-blue and green-blue distractors, it is not possible to guide search independently toward red items and green items or away from all blue items.     

3—6岁不同民族儿童颜色命名发展的比较

该文报告了我国大陆地区的汉族、蒙族、维族、壮族、白族及哈尼族3-6岁儿童的颜色命名发展的水平与差异。采用8种常见色片,即红、橙、黄、绿、蓝、紫及黑、白作为本实验用色样。结果表明：6个不同民族儿童的颜色正确命名率均随年龄增长而提高,不同民族儿童的颜色正确命名率存在一定差异。从总平均结果值来看,汉族儿童正确命名率为75．7％,蒙族为74．9％,哈尼族为59．8％,壮族为57．8％,白族为56．3％,维族为42．9％。对不同颜色的正确命名难易程度是不同的,但总的发展趋势是一致的,正确命名颜色的先后发展次序是：先是黑色、红色、白色,然后是黄色和绿色,再后是蓝色,最后是紫色与橙色。对儿童给予早期颜色命名教育可以明显提高和促进其颜色命名能力的发展。     

3～6岁儿童对11种基本颜色命名和分类研究

对3~6岁儿童11种基本颜色的命名和分类进行了研究。结果表明:⑴汉语儿童对11种基本颜色的正确命名率随年龄增长而提高,顺序是白、黑、红、黄、绿、蓝、粉红、紫、橙、灰和棕。(2)汉语儿童对基本颜色分类能力随年龄增长而提高。3~4岁儿童对基本颜色没有明确的分类标准。5岁儿童有了一定标准,并出现按“彩色/非彩色”和“冷色/暖色”分类的倾向。6岁儿童颜色分类标准更明确,开始由主观标准向客观标准转变。     

双重作业的颜色编码方式对作业绩效的影响

研究探讨了不同颜色编码方式对双重任务操作绩效的影响。实验结果证明：若采用同类颜色编码方式,同时操作的两种作业就会产生结构限制,降低双重任务操作绩效;相反,若采用异常颜色编码方式,将有效地减少双重任务操作的结构限制,使双重任务的操作绩效得到提高。     

Differential outcome effect in the horse

Three horses were trained with a discrimination task in which the color (blue or yellow) of a center panel signaled the correct (left or right) response (lever press). Reinforcing outcomes for the two correct color-position combinations (blue-left and yellow-right) were varied across phases. Discrimination performance was better when the combinations were differentially reinforced by two types of food (chopped carrot pieces and a solid food pellet) than when the combinations were randomly reinforced by these outcomes or when there was a common reinforcer for each of the correct combinations. However, the discrimination performance established by the differential outcome procedure was still 80% to 90% correct, and an analysis of two-trial sequences revealed that the stimulus color of the preceding trial interfered with discrimination performance on a given trial. Our demonstration of the differential outcome effect in the horse and its further analysis might contribute to more efficient control of equine behavior in the laboratory as well as in horse sports.     

大学生颜色词分类的研究

运用自然分类和多维标度法．对279名大学生进行了11种基本颜色词的分类研究、结果表明,大学生将11种基本颜色词分成三类：(1)非彩色,包括黑、白、灰,也包括色彩暗淡的棕色;(2)暖色,包括红、橙、黄和粉红色;(3)冷色．包括绿、蓝和紫。基本颜色词的语义空间有两个纬度：(1)彩色／非彩色;(2)冷色／暖色。不同专业大学生对颜色词分类基本一致,但也具有专业特点。     

The colors of the alphabet: naturally-biased associations between shape and color

Many letters of the alphabet are consistently mapped to specific colors in English-speaking adults, both in the general population and in individuals with grapheme-color synaesthesia who perceive letters in color. Here, across six experiments, we tested the ubiquity of the color/letter associations with typically developing toddlers, literate children, and adults. We found that pre-literate children associate O with white and X with black and discovered that they also associate I and ameboid nonsense shapes with white; Z and jagged nonsense shapes with black; and C with yellow; but do not make a number of other associations (B blue; Y yellow; A red; G green) seen in literate children and adults. The toddlers' mappings were based on the shape and not the sound of the letter. The results suggest that sensory cortical organization initially binds specific colors to some specific shapes and that learning to read can induce additional associations, likely through the influence of higher order networks as letters take on meaning.     

Effect of Icon Affiliation and Distance Moved on Detection of Icon Position Change on a Situation Awareness Display

Continuous gradual change is often difficult to detect, although it may be easy to detect the difference between the initial and end state if directly compared. Two experiments examined people's ability to detect gradual changes in icon position on a situation awareness map. People observed sequences of icon moves that consisted of ten .9-mm colinear moves or five 8.75-mm colinear moves and reported when they noticed a change. The relatively small moves were less likely to be detected than the relatively large moves; however, an entire sequence of the .9 mm moves was rarely missed. Green icon moves were significantly less likely to be detected than blue or yellow icon moves. This may have been due to the stimulus features of the icons or those features in interaction with the map background. Various methods that might assist icon change detection are discussed.     

吊车工人深度视觉阈值的测定

本研究对１０９名吊车工人进行了红橙黄绿蓝紫黑白等八种颜色的深度知觉阈限的测定．结果发现：在白色背景条件下,绿蓝两色为最佳深度色,最易辨别深度差异;黑紫红三色为二级深度色;橙黄两色为三级深度色;白色为四级深度色．易于深度辨别的颜色．,平均阈值小,分布较集中;不易深度辨别的颜色,平均阈值大,分布较分散．建议吊车设计部门,在吊钩臂部位的黄色背景上,涂上黑色条子．使吊车的吊钧本身具有颜色对比,少受作业环境的影响。     

红光照明条件下VDT不同显示色的视觉效果比较

本研究以VDT上持续进行的视觉作业速度和眼的调节辐合时间作为指标,对红光照明条件下VDT显示的红、黄、绿、蓝、白五种字符色的视觉效果进行了比较.实验中,VDT背景光的主波长为630nm.结果表明,五种字符色在两项指标上均表现出显著差异;绿色显示的视觉效果最好,红色显示的效果最差,黄、白、蓝三色处于中间.     

Effects of color of paper on which the Profile of Mood States is printed on the psychological states it measures.

The Profile of Mood States was printed on four different colors of paper (yellow, red, green, blue) and white to test whether the color of paper would influence mood state scores of 246 college students. Univariate analyses of variance identified color effects only on the Fatigue scale.     

Movement aftereffects contingent on color,intensity, and pattern

We have found contingent movement aftereffects (CMAEs) lasting several days, contingent upon the color, intensity, and stripe width of moving patterns. Ss adapted for 10 min to a patterned disk rotating clockwise under red light, alternating every 10 sec with counterclockwise under green light. When stopped, the disk then appeared to rotate counterclockwise under red light and clockwise under green light. The effect lasted only a second or two, reappearing each time the field’s color was changed. But it increased in strength over the first 1/2 hand was still present 1 or 2 days later. Color transposition effects were found: after adaptation to red-clockwise (long wavelength) alternating with green-counterclockwise (short wavelength), a stationary yellow (long wavelength) test field appeared to rotate counterclockwise and a blue (short wavelength) field appeared to rotate clockwise. Relative, not absolute, color of the test triggered the CMAE. Similar CMAEs and transposition effects were produced by pairing direction of movement with intensity, with width of moving stripes and with orientation of a stationary grating projected onto a rotating patterned disk.