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Chinese users’ preference for web browser icons

Chinese users’ preference for web browser icons
Chinese users’ preference for web browser icons
This paper compares the perspicacity, appropriateness and preference of web browser icons from leading software providers with those of a culture-specific design. The history and future direction of web browsers is outlined, together with the implications for the future growth of Chinese internet users. China, with its rapidly expanding young netizens has now overtaken the USA in terms of the number of internet users (253 million) and we predict it will reach saturation (?70% internet penetration rate) by 2012. If correct, this will have a dramatic effect on the use of English as the ‘Lingua Franca’ of the Internet. This online study was conducted in Taiwan and involved 103 participants (mean age 21 years), who were given three sets of web browser icons to review, namely Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0, Macintosh Safari 3.0, and culturally specific icons created using the Culture-Centred Design methodology. The findings of the study show that all three sets have generally high recognition rates, but that some icon functions (e.g. Go/Visit and Favourite) in all three sets have poor recognition rates and are considered inappropriate. Furthermore, some significant differences were found when we analysed the level of user experience amongst several icons
Shen, Siu-Tsen
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Prior, Stephen D.
9c753e49-092a-4dc5-b4cd-6d5ff77e9ced
Chen, Kuen-Meau
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Fang, Te-Hua
8ddd64a8-3c9b-4a81-ac30-84fc8c793a59
Shen, Siu-Tsen
3d7a9237-0668-4ebe-87a5-2725b268fbd3
Prior, Stephen D.
9c753e49-092a-4dc5-b4cd-6d5ff77e9ced
Chen, Kuen-Meau
8c4b0e7c-bb98-41c0-8326-f33a8fc68b46
Fang, Te-Hua
8ddd64a8-3c9b-4a81-ac30-84fc8c793a59

Shen, Siu-Tsen, Prior, Stephen D., Chen, Kuen-Meau and Fang, Te-Hua (2009) Chinese users’ preference for web browser icons. Design Principles and Practices, 3 (1).

Record type: Article

Abstract

This paper compares the perspicacity, appropriateness and preference of web browser icons from leading software providers with those of a culture-specific design. The history and future direction of web browsers is outlined, together with the implications for the future growth of Chinese internet users. China, with its rapidly expanding young netizens has now overtaken the USA in terms of the number of internet users (253 million) and we predict it will reach saturation (?70% internet penetration rate) by 2012. If correct, this will have a dramatic effect on the use of English as the ‘Lingua Franca’ of the Internet. This online study was conducted in Taiwan and involved 103 participants (mean age 21 years), who were given three sets of web browser icons to review, namely Microsoft Internet Explorer 7.0, Macintosh Safari 3.0, and culturally specific icons created using the Culture-Centred Design methodology. The findings of the study show that all three sets have generally high recognition rates, but that some icon functions (e.g. Go/Visit and Favourite) in all three sets have poor recognition rates and are considered inappropriate. Furthermore, some significant differences were found when we analysed the level of user experience amongst several icons

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More information

Published date: 2009
Organisations: Aeronautics, Astronautics & Comp. Eng

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 343534
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/343534
PURE UUID: f19baac2-f4c4-4a2a-8d2e-ec05ff16e227
ORCID for Stephen D. Prior: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0002-4993-4942

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 04 Oct 2012 09:19
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 03:45

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Contributors

Author: Siu-Tsen Shen
Author: Kuen-Meau Chen
Author: Te-Hua Fang

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