INTRODUCTION####

This book is very thought-provoking for me. As a designer, when I am designing a Web site or APP, I can use some suggestion from the book as guidelines to design better user experience. Later, I would like to take some most impressed things that I found from the book and combine them with my experience that I’ve gained through my study.

HOW PEOPLE SEE####

There’s a special part of the brain just for recognizing faces. Therefore, people recognize and react to faces on Web pages faster than anything else on the page. If I want to highlight a product, I would put a face looking at it. And I wouldn’t put more than one face on a screen, which, I assume, distract people.

People see cues that tell them what to do with an object. When I design a particular object which has interaction with people, I will think about whether my design can tell people affordance cues that correctly instruct them to act.

Nice percent of men and one-half percent of women are color-blind. For information graphics, I would like to avoid use red, green and blue. Instead, I would use varying shades of brown and yellow.

HOW PEOPLE READ####

Reading and comprehending are two different things. I realize that no matter how fantastic my words are, a larger percentage people won’t read them carefully. So, how could I grab their attention within a second even before they read the content? Provide a click bait title.

People read faster with a longer line length, but they prefer a shorter line length. When I design styles for paragraphs, I would restrain the line length between 9 and 14 words. Moreover, for a multipage article, I prefer to use multiple columns to short line length.

HOW PEOPLE REMEMBER####

Short-term memory is limited. Because people forget things that they learn in a short time very quickly, don’t ask them to remember information from one place to another, and don’t ask them to do anything else if you want people to remember things in short memory. Otherwise, they will probably get frustrated.

People remember only four items at once. Four is a magic number for design. For example, an APP normally have four tab buttons and the main category normally won’t have more than four subcategories. So, my hint is that including no more four items in each chunk.

People have to use information to make it stick. People use schemata to store information in long-term memory and to retrieve it. If I want people to remember something, I would do research for my target audiences and try to summarize schemata. It will be easier for them to learn and remember the information if they can plug it into an existing schema.

HOW PEOPLE THINK####

People process information better in bite-sized chunks. This tip is helpful for me to design multiple steps process. I would use progressive disclosure to show people what they need when they need it. Keep minimal information every time.

People wonder 30 percent of the time. After I learned this rule, I feel relieved for my distractions about the study. Everybody will only focus on a task for limited time. However, we can use continuous feedback to bring people back if they wander.

People interact with conceptual models. People always have a mental model and not everyone has the same mental model. Therefore, an important reason for doing user research is that we can understand the mental models of target audience so that we can design our product under the mental models and then people wouldn’t misunderstand the product.

People learn best from examples. I think that why Youtube is the second largest search engine in the world because most people feel easier to study one thing by watching a video tutorial rather than reading a tedious paragraph. Therefore, I would show people how to do something instead of just telling them.

Time is relative. I cannot agree with it more. The time when I spend with my girlfriend is always like a blink. On the contrary, the time when I cannot accompany with her is like a century. To make a progress seem shorter, we can break it up into steps and have people think less. I only have 6 months left before I can see you. And for each step, we can provide progress indicators to let people know how much time something is going to take.

HOW PEOPLE FOCUS THEIR ATTENTION####

Attention is selective. A person’s unconscious constantly scans the environment for certain things. These include their own name as well as messages about food, sex, and danger. So, it may not always appropriate to use food, sex, or danger for design, but use them when you can.

Expectations of frequency affect attention. People have an unconscious mental model of how often an event occurs. As designers, we should try to match our products to people’s mental model. If I need to let people notice an event that rarely happens, I would use a strong signal.

Sustained attention lasts about ten minutes. I would try to finish my presentation or tutorial within 10 minutes. If I have to hold attention longer than 10 minutes, I would talk a joke for each 10 minutes.

Loud noises startle and get attention. When we are designing an application, we may have control over the sounds when people take important actions, for example, reaching a goal or deleting a file. But, it should be reminded that people will habituate to a sound if they hear it for a long time and lose attention for it.

WHAT MOTIVATES PEOPLE####

People are more motivated as they get closer to a goal. The shorter the distance to the goal, the more motivated people are to reach it. Therefore, I would set some default finished tasks for users to make them feel they the end is nearer to them.

Variable rewards are powerful. People like surprise so don’t give them constant rewards. For example, by giving people prizes randomly, in a gamble way, people would be more likely to be addicted to the rewarding pattern.

Dopamine makes people addicted to seeking information. Do you find it impossible to ignore your emails? I do. I wouldn’t blame myself anymore after I know this mechanism. Instead, I would try to find ways prevent me from getting information.

People are more motivated by intrinsic rewards than extrinsic rewards. It makes sense to say that money isn’t everything in this situation. Furthermore, if we can design a product which can build connections between people, people then will be motivated to use it. No wonder Facebook is popular all over the world.

People are motivated by progress, mastery, and control. After we master something, we may feel bored about it. So when we design an application, we cannot design it too hard to make people understand. Meanwhile, we also need to design challenging activities that people inherently want to do.

PEOPLE ARE SOCIAL ANIMALS####

People are hard-wired for imitation and empathy. It is an interesting finding that if you want someone like you more, you can imitate his or her behaviors when you are talking with each other. And it is deducted that video is especially compelling for influencing people if you show a video of other people’s behaviors.

Doing things together bonds people together. Even if you don’t feel good about the group, or the group activity, the act of doing the synchronous activity seems to strengthen social attachment among the group members. I would like to join more activities with other people to build a bonding connection.

The brain responds uniquely to people you know personally. It may be important to distinguish between social media for friends and relatives, such as Facebook, versus social media for people you’re not already connected to, such as LinkedIn. But this tip also encourages me to know people who don’t have a lot in common with me.

Laughter bonds people together. What is my takeaway is being nice and smile a lot. We don’t necessarily need humor or jokes to get people to laugh. Normal conversation and interactions will produce enough laughter. Also, if you want people to laugh, then laugh yourself. Laughter is contagious.

HOW PEOPLE FEEL####

Anecdotes persuade more than data. When I make a presentation, I would like to include data to make it persuasive. But my presentation would be more powerful if I focus on one or more anecdotes.

People are programmed to enjoy surprise. I would provide novel and unexpected content to users, because it not only gets attention, but also can be actually pleasurable.

People are happier when they’re busy. I am the kind of person who doesn’t like to be idle, but the task has to be seen as worthwhile. If you have a task that requires people to wait, you’d better have something interesting for them to do while waiting.

People use look and feel as their first indicator of trust. First impression is significant. People make quick decisions about what is not trustworthy. Design factors, such as color, font, layout, and navigation, are critical in making it through the first “trust rejection” phase.

People want what is familiar when they’re sad or scared. People protect themselves. And a quick way to be safe is to go with what you know. So when people are sad or scared, they’ll go for a brand and logo they know.

PEOPLE MAKE MISTAKES####

People make predictable types of errors. People will make different types of errors, such as commission errors, omission errors and wrong-action errors, in learning about and using your product. Before we conduct user testing and user observation, we can predict the possible errors we are most concerned about.

HOW PEOPLE DECIDE####

The unconscious knows first. The unconscious acts more quickly than the conscious mind. We all have the experience that sometimes we have preferences, but cannot explain why we prefer. It would be super helpful to know people’s unconscious mind to influence them when they even are not aware of that.

People thinks choice equals control. People won’t always choose the fastest way to complete a task. When we are deciding how our audience will accomplish a task with our product, we can offer more than one way, even if the alternative methods are less efficient. And I suppose that is why Photoshop keep some the older methods in the products so that people feel they have options.

Mood influences the decision making process. It is not always a good idea to make people happy. People in a good mood will rate a product as being more valuable if they are asked to make decision quickly. However, people in a sad mood will rate a product as being more valuable if they are asked to make the decision in a more deliberate way.

People are swayed by a dominant personality. The leader spokes first. If you design as a group, be careful of following the first solution just because it’s first. Similarly, if you want to be a leader and influence a decision successfully, speaking first please.

CONCLUSION####

I am impressed by the content of the book. And I would like to learn most things in the psychology field, which is very relevant the UX field I study. If you want to provide a better user experience, you have to figure out what is good user experience in users’ mind, which means you have to analyze their thoughts.**