Where to Look: Can You Predict Where People Will Look when Presented with a Visual Image?

Overview

Objectives/Goals The experiment was meant to show if you can be predicted where most people would look, or where the eye goes first. Because we read left to right, top to bottom, I predict the upper left area of a visual image is where most people will look first. Methods/Materials About two hundred students in seven intermediate-grade classrooms were tested four times, using transparencies and an overhead projector. Each transparency had four large block letters. The tests were kept from view until shown, one at a time, on the overhead projector for about two seconds each. The survey forms were passed out before the testing began, and asked for age, boy or girl, and if left or right handed, but no name. The tests were conducted at various times during the school day. After the four tests, the surveys were collected and the results tabulated. Results In all of the categories, there were more responses marked for the image in the upper left corner than any other. The upper right had the second most responses, and the lower left and right hand corner#s responses were very low. Conclusions/Discussion With intermediate school students, you can predict that the upper left area will be chosen most often. If the experiment were done on younger children, or a group whose language reads differently, then the results might be different.

Competition history

• CSEF 2004 Behavioral Sciences · Entry J0338

Resources

• CSEF project summary ↗

Related projects

Closest projects by meaning, across every fair and year in the corpus.

Browse more like this

• All Behavioural and Social Sciences projects
• CSEF Behavioural and Social Sciences projects
• Every CSEF 2004 project