A designer’s dream and nightmare: to redesign a publication every several months to perfection. American newspapers customarily go through a redesign every five to seven years. News-related websites redesign every six to 12 months. In some virtual newsrooms, online redesign planning occurs immediately after a new design is launched.
This year we’ve seen certain redesign trends. For example, Mercury Center and CNN Interactive changed their interfaces to reflect much faster, leaner sites by making most of their navigational devices hypertext rather than graphics.
And we’ve seen inconsistent redesigns. Take for instance the early home pages of The New York Times on the Web and The Boston Globe’s Boston.com. These were initially designed to fit on a single screen, to avoid scrolling. Their new home pages are a few screens deep.
Then there are the redesigns of MSNBC, the Chicago Tribune Internet Edition, and Phillynews.com. You’ll notice a return to the single screen approach from multiple screens.
What does this mean? As I see it, we’re still testing. Since the industry remains in its infancy, few models of excellence exist, and no rulebooks. So we experiment.
However, when we try to do everything, we can lose focus. In newspapers, we can point to widely accepted examples of good newspaper design based on research studies. Very few examples exist for online news.
A collaborative research effort by Stanford University’s Department of Communication, the Archimedes Project, and Poynter plans to address this problem.
What’s the research about?
Focus.
We want to gain better knowledge of how content and layout of online news influences what people choose to read and the manner in which it is read. What do readers focus on when getting their news from the web? In a medium that bears a stronger resemblance to television than to newspapers, how do they read and navigate? How much do they read? Are there story forms that work better online than in print? How does site design influence a reader’s choice and behavior? And what are the best ways for presenting news on electronic media?
An earlier project by Professor Marion Lewenstein of Stanford University’s Department of Communication examined the behavior of individuals as they read text-based news on a computer. Her research is being coupled to the latest research technology. In the Archimedes Project at Stanford’s Center for the Study of Language and Information (CSLI), Greg Edwards is developing eye-tracking tools that automate the collection and analysis of reading patterns to understand how eye movement is related to a reader’s behavior and understanding. These tools make it possible to determine when a user is reading, looking at pictures, or scanning the page; the number of lines of an article that have been read; how much time was spent reading each word; when a word or line is re-read; and when the reader appears to be confused.
Professor Lewenstein’s team at Stanford and Poynter will continue to gather and analyze data by videotaping and interviewing subjects in addition to using the data obtained from the eye-track software. She will also study the effect of formatted electronic news on citizens’ participation in a democratic society. Deborah Tatar, a recent Stanford Ph.D. in psychology who has had extensive experience with computers and software design, will work with Edwards and Lewenstein.
In many instances, this study will be similar to Poynter’s color research, which resulted in the book Eyes on the News by Dr. Mario R. Garcia and Dr. Pegie Stark Adam. Just as in the original research, this study will be conducted in three regions to give it geographic and ethnic diversity: the San Francisco Bay area, Chicago, and Tampa Bay. About 25-30 participants will be involved at each test site.
However, because of the differences in medium, some aspects of the study will be approached differently. Rather than being asked to read from a prepared newspaper prototype, participants will be asked to read actual online news based on their own environments, use their own bookmarks, and visit sites they regularly read for news. This will allow each participant to “surf” naturally.
As a visiting professional at Poynter, I am coordinating the involvement of the Institute, guided by Poynter faculty Ron Reason, Mario Garcia, Pegie Stark Adam, and others. We will conduct an online survey prior to the beginning of the study soliciting suggestions from online editors, designers, and producers to help determine what issues require research.
The Poynter Institute will serve as the conduit between the research and the industry.
