These studies suggest that for certain menus there may be performance advantages in having choices placed on the right side of options. This holds for measures of both speed and accuracy. However, for some menus there is a slight advantage for having choices on the left side. Accuracy levels tended to be better with choices positioned to the right of options. The results suggest that practitioners should consider the relative positioning of options and choices in the design of user interfaces.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
BaileyR.W. (1989). Human Performance Engineering: Using Human Factors/Ergonomics to Achieve Computer System Usability, 2nd Edition.Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.
2.
IBM Technical Document (July, 1989). Systems Application Architecture - Common User Access for non-programmable terminals. SC 26–4583–0, User Interface Technology Planning, Boca Raton, Florida.
3.
IngleC.A. (1985). Format of menu screens. AT&T Internal Memoranda..
4.
SchneidermanB. (1986) Designing menu selection systems. Journal of the American Society for Information Sciences, 31, 57–70.