Making information more understandable

Author

author's viewpoint and thoughts and relationship with other people.

Thinking

having to do with the content of a presentation - the process of finding ideas and their relationship.

Expression

putting the ideas into writing - includes word usage, sentences, paragraphs and overall content development.

Presentation

showing the basic content using available tools such as typography and illustration.

The author

One starting thought about making information easier to understand is that people generally have considerable ability to explain things without extensive training. For people concerned with communicating, we start off with an established talent, and to it we can add some of the expressive nature of spoken communication and to that we can add what is unique to written communication.

You are what you eat according to one saying, and in a sense that's true. However, what we take in is changed into a very different order. Thoughts about celery are very different than celery itself!

What we think and how we see things is much more related to the mental stuff we receive. You tell me that celery is mainly water, and if I believe you, then I think the same thing that you think. That shows that thought can be and even must be copied in communication. Because of the fact that our thinking is made up of what we think and since what we are is really what we have apart from our possessions and activities, then it makes sense to consider foundational principles of thinking. That's not something abstract or "for the philosophers". It's how to decide if we're on a beneficial course in planning and working toward the completion of a project.

We need principles that sustain us in the constant flow of information, marketing, needs, wants, and dispositions of people. We need something that is a better guide than the loudness of someone else's voice, the "vicissitudes of life" as President Washington said in his farewell address, or the oftimes imaginative fear that humans are "heir to". What's that on the roof, it's a robber! No, it's a twig.

While the examples may seem frivolous in comparison with the concerns of life, it's not trivial to be wracked with mental pain over something that is chiefly imagined or exaggerated beyond significance. The vicissitudes of life are those sharp and piercing events that bring mental pain. We already have complications to deal with, and that's why we could use some direction in overcoming opposition, even the opposition of our own habits or ways of thinking. We need some new thoughts if we want to replace any thoughts that we have now.

Designing for better understanding requires knowing some things. Some prerequisites are believing that there are differences in the understandability of written materials and that additional knowledge can help a person pick the differences that result in information that is easier to understand.

The following principles help provide focus and direction in designing for understanding. A profound comment from a book about computer programming is that what is understood will be reused. Therefore, principles that are understandable and yield understanding should be very useful!

The principles are based on II Peter 1: 5-7 from the Bible. As examples of using the principles, I've included some recommendations from Paul Heckel's book, The Elements of Friendly Software Design. The examples show design-thinking and do not claim to be based on these particular principles, yet use of the principles can bring these kinds of results.

Principle - Example from computer program design.

additional comment

Trustworthy - Make Your Product Reliable.

no more promises than can be kept!

Excellent - Know Your Subject.

excellence is more than knowledge; however, there is excellent knowledge

True - Orient the User in the World.

an important characteristic of what is true is that it is real

Controlled - Develop and Maintain User Rapport.

staying in touch with customers and customer requests requires diligence and focus

Patient - Avoid Frustrating the User.

so don't be frustrated yourself!

Respectful - Serve Both the Novice and the Experienced User.

and respect them both

Worthwhile - Build a Model in the User's Mind.

because that's something that will be very worthwhile for them

Giving - Give the User Control.

give them something that they would like to have!

Thinking

• Present material worthy of review - Give the user information that's worth thinking about.
• Identify users, tasks, questions, and set objectives. I think that Jacob Nielson said that in his Multimedia book.

Expression

Emphasis should be controlled so that it amplifies the message itself and not secondary concerns.

State the goal

• Include objectives that state the goal of instruction to direct the reader's attention.
• Choose topic clusters, topics, media elements. Jacob Nielson
• "In general, if a topic is longer than one screen or scrolling zone, a brief introduction can make it more effective." Jacob Nielson

Use understandable means

• Provide definitions and examples of any prerequisite information.
• Organize the text around the major ideas.
• Use a topic sentence at the beginning of each paragraph.
• Use metaphor, imagery, familiar examples and analogies for the explanative ideas.
• Label the major explanative ideas.
• State important principles positively.
• Use more words for more important information.
• Show what arguments are considered to be correct and incorrect.
• Include questions in the text that focus attention on explanative information to encourage active processing.
• Provide summaries that emphasize the key ideas so that the reader can compare his notes with the author's.
• Include repetition of important ideas in various wordings: build redundancy into the passage so that the reader has several opportunities to get exposed to the main points.
• Use examples that show the use of information.
• Tighten the relationship between examples and important concepts.
• "Design topics so they are understandable--or at least not confusing--if read out of order. At the same time, design them to encourage and support reading patterns that will help users." Jacob Nielson

Relate to user

• Build on the basis of users' knowledge - The user's existing knowledge should be used.
• Relate information to users' knowledge - Relate new information to user's personal knowledge.
• Accommodate differences - Give access to different levels of knowledge, learning and meaning.
• Speak the users' language - Present new information in a manner that relates to existing knowledge.
• Relate to real life - Use real-life concerns and circumstances.
• Help according to need - Provide help for the strategist, learner, and beginner.
• Adapt dynamically - Design the presentation so that it fits the needs of differing individuals.
• Provide many opportunities to learn - Teach flexibility through example and numerous viewpoints.

Simplify

• Make purposes self-evident - Design so that information tools are as understandable as household tools.
• Make procedures easy - Treat the user easy with simple and complete navigation tools.
• Simplify presentation - Design should complement and not compete with information content.

Focus the information

• Organize the presentation - Information presentation is as important as content.
• Present summaries - State objectives and review what has been accomplished.
• Use transitions of focus - Use the relatedness of subjects and disciplines to advantage.
• Control exposition of content - Spare the user needless effort; keep the process focused.

Involve the user

• Request the users' focus - Extensive learning requires attention.
• Invite response - Give opportunities for user response.

Presentation

Use visible means

• Early in the passage, use captioned visual frames for the major explanative components of the topic.
• Show the mapping between examples (or analogies) and the major explanative ideas.
• Continue the visual presentation of the main ideas through showing the major explanative ideas and important points in the text in a manner such as enumeration.
• Make the organization evident through headings, indentations and introductory comments.
• Show the relationships between conceptually related elements by using graphically related presentation of those elements. There should be a recognizeable sameness between same-type elements.
• Underline technical terms.
• Provide data using multiple means - Use graphics, design, words and network resources together.
• Use visual means - Graphic knowledge maps show the relationship and content of topics.
• Select individual media elements, topics, clusters of topics. Jacob Nielson

The best one-item collection of information that I've found about how to design hypertext systems is Empirically-Based Guidelines for the Design of Interactive Multimedia, Educational Technology Research and Development, Volume 41, Number 3, 1993, p63-85, Innwoo Park and Michael J. Hannafin. The call number of the journal at Evans Library is P/87/A82.

Some of the topics above are based on a list from the article. My treatment of the individual items may lack some significant distinctions.