2. Why talk about CogSci?
• To understand human cognitive capabilities and
limitations.
• To help us evaluate our designs & design patterns
more meaningfully.
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3. Visual Perception
• Not just vision!
• Complex process that takes place along the eye-brain
pathway and back.
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5. Bottom-up
• First stage: Low-level features
• Second stage: Patterns
• Third stage: Objects
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6. Top-down
• Task/goal oriented
- Behavioral
- Cognitive
• Constant linking and re-linking of visual and non-
visual information.
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7. Patterns
• At this level:
- different elements become either linked or
segregated
- visual processing is at its highest
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8. The Gestalt Principles
• Gestalt can be translated as ‘shape’ or ‘form’
• The term refers to how visual input is perceived by
human beings.
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12. The Gestalt Principles
• Gestalt theory describes how the mind organizes
visual data.
• The stronger the clarity of form, the more effective
the design.
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13. The law of Similarity
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