Let's talk about... neuroscience
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The document discusses the intersection of neuroscience and user experience (UX) design, highlighting the importance of understanding brain function in enhancing usability. It covers various brain regions involved in processing information and decision-making, emphasizing the need to reduce cognitive load for better user experiences. Additionally, it provides practical design guidelines based on cognitive principles to improve application usability.
![Dr. Suzana Herculano-Houzel
“We found that on average the human brain has
86bn neurones [nerve cell that is the basic
building block of the nervous system]. And not
one [of the brains] that we looked at so far has
the 100bn."](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/letstalkabout-161119154550/85/Let-s-talk-about-neuroscience-7-320.jpg)
Let's talk about... neuroscience
- 1. Let’s talk about (neuro)science and its importance in usability/UX of an application
- 2. Who am I? Andreea Popescu speaker and volunteer andreeazpopescu @andreea_popescu usability/UX specialist @Evozon passionate about (neuro)science, HCI, photography & hiking
- 3. What do you think usability is?
- 4. Joel Spolsky, User Interface Design for Programmers “Usability, fundamentally, is a matter of bringing a bit of human rights into the world of computer- human interaction. It's a way to let our ideals shine through in our software, no matter how mundane the software is.”
- 6. Johannes Robbies, UX Redefined Winning and Keeping Customers with Enhanced Usability and User Experience “The human brain weighs about 1.4 kilograms - that's only 2 percent of our body weight - but it use more than 20 percent of our body energy.”
- 7. Dr. Suzana Herculano-Houzel “We found that on average the human brain has 86bn neurones [nerve cell that is the basic building block of the nervous system]. And not one [of the brains] that we looked at so far has the 100bn."
- 8. frontal lobe
- 9. The frontal lobe is the center of our emotional network (“How did I experience it?”) and our cognitive network (“That’s how I experienced it.”).
- 11. The parietal lobes mediate tactile and kinaesthetic perception (left lobe: information processing; right lobe: combining of diverse visual, auditory, tactile information into non- language).
- 12. frontal lobe parietal lobe temporal lobe
- 13. The temporal lobe serves to organise hearing and memory.
- 14. frontal lobe parietal lobe temporal lobe occipital lobe
- 15. The occipital lobe register the characteristics of what we see and then send the information on to the parental lobes for interpretations.
- 16. These are some examples about how our brain works!
- 17. Prefrontal cortex: not paying attention to unnecessary information —> cortical flaw has been exacerbated by modernity —> too much information.
- 19. Rewards and motivation. Stimulates dopamine, one of the main neurotransmitters, which is heavily active in the frontal lobe.
- 21. Patterns activate predictions and stimulate neurons, and this way the user finds it easier to improve their experiences. Schultz, a physician who explored the human brain in the 70s, “if everything goes according to plan, its dopamine neurons secrete a little burst of enjoyment”.
- 23. Cognitive control and value-based decision-making tasks appear to depend on different brain regions within the prefrontal cortex. Too many options for choosing an activity create ‘noise’ in the brain, that is mentally exhausting.
- 25. Left alignment: users can read each line by simply moving their eyes to the left edge each time. This makes your paragraphs faster and easier to read because the user’s eyes don’t have to work as hard to find where the line starts each time.
- 27. Visual cortex: do not use decorative fonts, because it’s harder for the brain to find shapes in them.
- 29. Reducing the cognitive load (as remembering, thinking, making decisions) takes less brain effort. E.g. scrolling takes less brain power thank clicking.
- 31. the auditory part of the new brain that deciphers sound (told) vision and text processing (read) all the vision parts of the brain (to imagine the characters) the emotional part of the mid brain
- 33. - Dr. David Eagleman “Every single neuron in the brain is complicated as New York city.”
- 34. Resources • “Making Choices: How Your Brain Decides”: http://healthland.time.com/ 2012/09/04/making-choices-how-your-brain-decides/ • “SpinalCord”: http://www.spinalcord.com/frontal-lobe • “UX Redefined Winning and Keeping Customers with Enhanced Usability and User Experience, Johannes Robbies, 2015 • “How does the brain work when confronted with an interface?”, Marc Van Rymenant: http://www.simplifyinginterfaces.com/2008/07/09/how-does-the- brain-work-when-confronted-with-an-interface-episod-2/ • “Why You Should Never Center Align Paragraph Text”: http://uxmovement.com/ content/why-you-should-never-center-align-paragraph-text/ • “10 ways to design for the human brain”: http://blog.invisionapp.com/design- for-the-human-brain/ Resources
- 35. Thank you.