Engineering topics
Publications and source records attributed to O'Brien, Kevin M..
Report describes study of effect of highlighting on speed with which one searches and finds information on complex alphanumeric display. In study, 12 human subjects tested with variety of information displays in which highlighting, format, and type of data manipulated.
Display format and highlight validity were shown to affect visual display search performance; however, these studies were conducted on small, artificial displays of alphanumeric stimuli. A study manipulating these variables was conducted using realistic, complex Space Shuttle information displays. A 2x2x3 within-subjects analysis of variance found that search times were faster for items in reformatted displays than for current displays. The significant format by highlight validity interaction showed that there was little difference in response time to both current and reformatted displays when the highlight validity was applied; however, under the non or invalid highlight conditions, search times were faster with reformatted displays. Benefits of highlighting and reformatting displays to enhance search and the necessity to consider highlight validity and format characteristics in tandem for predicting search performance are discussed.