Design by Consensus: A New Method for Designing Effective Pictograms

Authors

  • Mike Zender
  • Alisa Strauss

Abstract

A pictogram is useless if people cannot comprehend its meaning. Current pictogram design practice typically involves a designer envisioning what might represent a concept then drawing a pictogram that they think represents it. In this the designer is informed by their own experience and perhaps some study of pictograms with similar meanings. Unfortunately, this practice has been proven to frequently fail. Our previous studies have shown that designers create more comprehensible pictograms when they are aware that most pictograms consist of several icons and graphemes, know which of those to include, and understand how to draw each icon. This study focuses on one of these essential processes: what icons people expect to see in a representation of a concept. It explores the use of consensus analysis techniques in determining - before even a rough draft of the pictogram is created - which icons are most needed. Once data obtained via freelisting, pilesorting, and ranking were analyzed using consensus analysis, the symbols that should be included in each pictogram were determined. Pictograms were then designed using those icons and were evaluated for comprehension. Results indicate that using techniques of quantitative ethnography to guide pictogram design improves comprehension of the resulting pictogram.

Downloads

Published

2017-08-01

Issue

Section

Journal Article