Colours have an effect on mood and feelings of people. There are several studies carried out to specify the impact colours have on human psychology and behavior; The results are used for therapy and for example interior design. Colours also have an important role to play in the web design and the designers should take advantage of the effects different combinations have. Still, loads of strange solutions are there to be seen online. On the one hand it might be poor knowledge on design, on the other hand it could just as well be an approach from different culture. The research carried out in Canada amongst three cultural groups - namely Candada, Germany and Japan - tried to specify the impact colour appeal has on user's trust, satisfaction and e-loyality using experiment, survey and previous research.
In todays web, with the variety of web 2.0 solutions available, catching attention, gaining and keeping the users by providing them with trustworthy and satisfactory environment has crucial role. Dianne Cyr (2009) states that little research has been done to reveal the effect of online applications' colours on the users of different cultures. For this study an experimental environment was created based on an e-commerce site for purchising electronics.
The site was redesigned in three versions - grey, yellow and blue, representing respectively the hypotetical preferances of canadians, japanese and german users. These preferances were found browsing through 30 municipal websites from each country. The authors expected to get confirmation to the hypotesis through the experiments and survey among 30 students from each country. However, it is rather radical to expect japanese to prefer yellow, germans blue and canadians grey design. The results were in this direction but did not meet authors expectations fully.
Nevertheless, the results showed that colour appeal does have effect on the user's trust and satisfaction towards the site and these implicate the e-loyality. For these questions, the results of the eye-tracking experiment and survey were used. All participants browsed all three webs ites with different colour schemas. The authors are rather unsatisfied with their results but find that the research gives good impulse and beginning for further studies in the field. The knowledge of colour appeal in web design, the way colours affect user behaviour, mood, reactions and perception will benefit the designers as they put it into practics.
Reading the material given leads to discover more on the relationship of colours and human-computer interaction, successful interface design and perceptions among different cultures. One very interesting tool used in given research was eye-tracking. A great tool to evaluate the reactions person has in a fraction of a second, where is the most catchy point in the design, for how long the eyes stay there before finding the next point etc. Many ides to be followed from this readig. Until the next post.
Reference:
Cyr, D., et al., Colour appeal in website design within and across cultures: A multi-method evaluation. International Journal of Human Computer Studies (2009),
doi:10.1016/j.ijhcs.2009.08.005
In todays web, with the variety of web 2.0 solutions available, catching attention, gaining and keeping the users by providing them with trustworthy and satisfactory environment has crucial role. Dianne Cyr (2009) states that little research has been done to reveal the effect of online applications' colours on the users of different cultures. For this study an experimental environment was created based on an e-commerce site for purchising electronics.
The site was redesigned in three versions - grey, yellow and blue, representing respectively the hypotetical preferances of canadians, japanese and german users. These preferances were found browsing through 30 municipal websites from each country. The authors expected to get confirmation to the hypotesis through the experiments and survey among 30 students from each country. However, it is rather radical to expect japanese to prefer yellow, germans blue and canadians grey design. The results were in this direction but did not meet authors expectations fully.
Nevertheless, the results showed that colour appeal does have effect on the user's trust and satisfaction towards the site and these implicate the e-loyality. For these questions, the results of the eye-tracking experiment and survey were used. All participants browsed all three webs ites with different colour schemas. The authors are rather unsatisfied with their results but find that the research gives good impulse and beginning for further studies in the field. The knowledge of colour appeal in web design, the way colours affect user behaviour, mood, reactions and perception will benefit the designers as they put it into practics.
Reading the material given leads to discover more on the relationship of colours and human-computer interaction, successful interface design and perceptions among different cultures. One very interesting tool used in given research was eye-tracking. A great tool to evaluate the reactions person has in a fraction of a second, where is the most catchy point in the design, for how long the eyes stay there before finding the next point etc. Many ides to be followed from this readig. Until the next post.
Reference:
Cyr, D., et al., Colour appeal in website design within and across cultures: A multi-method evaluation. International Journal of Human Computer Studies (2009),
doi:10.1016/j.ijhcs.2009.08.005
What theory did they base their opinions on? I mean, take a hypothetical colour and think that ALL people from the same culture prefer the same? Funny, but I think that for most Estonians it would be black then, hypothetically. Actually from time to time we surveyed among our coursemates who wore which colour - and it appeared that mostly most of the people really wore black. This is an interesting concept you are studying. I will move on to the other blog posts, but I think I would not read this article for sure.
ReplyDeleteThe part where the researchers were applying their hypothesis of different colours (yellow, blue, gray) being more appealing to different cultures (Japan, Germany, Canada)was for me also not very serious - they have oversimplified their hypothesis.
ReplyDeleteThe other part, however, is more serious while they tracked the behaviour of users when visiting three differently manipulated (in colour) sites, did a survey on that among 90 users and stated the connection between trust, satisfaction and e-loyalty..