Keywords

aesthetics, satisfaction, emotion, usability, credibility, heuristics, web design

Abstract

This thesis explores the role aesthetics plays in informational websites. In commercial interfaces, aesthetics (the perceived visual appeal and appropriateness of an object) has shown to correlate positively with many aspects of usability and emotional satisfaction. This thesis examines whether aesthetics has similar positive correlations in informational websites. Heuristics or guidelines for evaluating informational websites are developed based on empirical research and practitioner expertise. Categories for heuristic evaluation include usability, credibility, visual clarity, visual richness, and emotional satisfaction. A class of graduate students browsed three academic websites, evaluated them, and critiqued the heuristics. Results indicate that aesthetics does correlate with overall impression, usability, satisfaction, and credibility. The data also suggests that there are two dimensions of aesthetics: visual richness and visual clarity. Overall impression correlated with the average of all categories. The heuristics used in this pilot study are now ready to be tested on a larger population.

Notes

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Graduation Date

2005

Semester

Spring

Advisor

Saari Kitalong, Karla

Degree

Master of Arts (M.A.)

College

College of Arts and Sciences

Department

English

Degree Program

English

Format

application/pdf

Identifier

CFE0000465

URL

http://purl.fcla.edu/fcla/etd/CFE0000465

Language

English

Release Date

January 2007

Length of Campus-only Access

None

Access Status

Masters Thesis (Open Access)

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