January 17, 2006
How Long Does It Take to Decide That We Like A Website?
According to a study conducted by Canadian researchers, published in the journal "Behaviour & Information Technology," it takes but a blink of the eye for an internet user to make up his/her mind about the quality of a website.
The researchers were pleasantly surprised by their findings that the human brain takes about a twentieth of a second to decide on the appeal of a website - they seriously thought it would take at least 10 times longer to form an opinion.
The Canadian team wrote that visual appeal can be assessed within 50 milliseconds, which means that web designers have only 50 milliseconds to create an impact on users. Significantly, the research proved that the age-old maxim about first impressions still very much holds good.
In this study, volunteers were shown 50 millisecond glimpses of Web sites, and asked them to rate the sites basis their aesthetic appeal. Users were then asked to examine the site carefully, and provide a second rating. The researchers found the 2 ratings closely tallying.
According to the study, first impressions last because of a "halo effect". This means that if people believe a website looks good, then this positive quality will spread to other areas such as the website's content.
Journal Behaviour & Information Technology
Posted by rsk at January 17, 2006 09:10 AM