Visual Characteristics' Inherent Impact on People's Strategic Orientation

Digitally mediated tasks are becoming an indispensable part of our daily life. However, they often suppose different kinds of strategies to be solved with success (e.g., creativity, accuracy). The strategies people use to for task solving might unintentionally be influenced by graphic user interfaces' (GUI) visual characteristics. The present research investigates this topic by focusing on impacts related to isolated colors and forms. First, a word association test showed that specific color and form characteristics are associated to ideas of threat or, on the contrary, of comfort. An anagram-solving test then demonstrated that color and form stimuli influence performance differently depending on these associations: Participants solved comfort-related anagrams faster when presented in combination with visual stimuli associated to comfort ideas (i.e., orange, round forms). Conversely, vigilance-related anagrams were solved faster when presented in association with visual stimuli associated to threat. These findings strongly suggest that color and form elements used in GUIs can impact user's approach and sensitivity to specific information. Depending on the kind of tasks (e.g., demanding creativity or accuracy), the effects can either support solving or impair it. Further researches should transfer the present results to concrete computer mediated tasks.