"Should I Fill In This Chart With Dots or Lines ?": A Pilot Study on the Effectiveness of Visual Elements in Information Displays
Laura J. Gurak, Philip M. Rubens, D. Steirer · 1992
Charts and graphs (information displays) are important aspects of technical communication, but there are many unanswered questions about how what visual features work best. This paper offers background literature and presents the results of a study which examined how users responded to differently designed versions of a bar chart. Preliminary results suggest that charts which rely on shape cues may be processed more quickly, while charts which rely on shading cues may be processed more accurately.