Web design requires understanding users' perceptions and goals in order to create engaging sites. Users come from diverse backgrounds and their past experiences bias how they view sites. Their current context and what they seek also influence perceptions. As designers, we must be consistent, clear, and understand user goals. Additionally, human visual perception follows Gestalt principles like proximity, similarity, and closure that impact how users interact with sites. Understanding these science-based concepts will allow designers to create robust experiences that users will enjoy and return to.

1. Reaction Paper 1
Web design does not operate under the “if you build it, they will come mentality.” Just because you design a
web site or application, does not mean people will come, let alone stay and review or use it. In order to build
and maintain a useful and engaging web site, we must ultimately be cognizant of our users, their perceptions,
and the science behind those perceptions. What one user likes, another may hate, and how do you design for
that?
These introductory chapters by Johnson highlight the diversity of the users who will encounter any web site and
the reasons behind the diversity. The perception of users who come to your site will be biased by their past, the
current context they are operating in, and their goals/expectations. For example, depending on what platform
or browser a user has used previously will bias where they expect to find certain things on your site.
Additionally, their current context will affect their perceptions. What they are seeing, smelling, doing now will
influence their views of a site. Additionally, what they are seeking from your site is important too. If they are
looking for something in particular, they may miss a multitude of other important things. As designers, we need
to be consistent, be clear, and understand the goals of the users who will be visiting our using our sites.
As we learned from the Niederst Robbins reading, “The web is a visual medium.” Therefore, it is important to
take into account how human visual perception works. The Gestalt principles of visual perception help us, as
designers, take into account HOW a user will interact with a site and they psychology behind it. The concept of
proximity involves the proximity of objects and whether or not they appear grouped. Poor placement of objects
can cause confusion. The concept of similarity states that objects that look similar will appear to be grouped. Do
not make objects look the same if they are unrelated. Continuity explains our “visual system’s tendency to
resolve ambiguity or fill in missing data.” Closure explains how we can fill in empty spaces based on previous
experience. Symmetry explains how we can take complex scenes and simplify them usually into symmetrical set
ups. The figure/ground describes our ability to “see” one-dimensional items as two- or even three-dimensional.
Common fate explains that objects that move together appear to be grouped together. All of these principles
work together as a user navigates your site. They also may affect each other in unintended ways. Understanding
these concepts and specific biases will help us as we design user experiences.
Understanding the science and explanation behind all these concepts and principles will allow us to design
robust and engaging experiences for our users; hopefully, if we build it, they will come—and stay.
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References:
Johnson, Jeff. Designing with the Mind in Mind: Simple Guide to Understanding User Interface Design Rules.
Amsterdam: Morgan Kaufmann/Elsevier, 2010. Print.
Niederst, Robbins Jennifer. Learning Web Design: a Beginner's Guide to (X)HTML, Style Sheets and Web
Graphics. Beijing: O'Reilly, 2007. Print.