Re: Too much data

At 02:54 PM 2/3/2011, Ryan Hanau wrote:
>It's for the healthcare industry and used by doctors who typically 
>don't have a lot of time to spend with the display. The common 
>practice is to squeeze lots of data onto a single screen. It's my 
>belief that at some point that is a bad idea. More screens with less 
>data would probably be more effective.

Hi Ryan,

One thought that's a bit off the topic of your original question (my 
apologies if it's something you've already thought about):

You certainly don't want to give them more data than they need for 
the task at hand. Is it clear from other research what data they 
always need for a particular task and what data they might need in 
special circumstances? There may be ways to divide up the data that 
give your doctors just what they need when they need it. If you don't 
already have the answers, contextual research can be very good for 
uncovering the tasks you need to support and the data you need to 
provide for each task.

Best,

Mitchell

>On Thu, Feb 3, 2011 at 5:06 PM, Mitchell Gass 
><<mailto:[email protected]>[email protected]> 
>wrote:
>At 01:35 PM 2/3/2011, Ryan Hanau wrote:
>Can anyone refer me to any research on how much data a display can 
>hold before it overwhelms its users and comprehension/retention rates go down?
>
>I imagine data density and comprehension/retention rates is 
>bell-curved shaped: too little, just right, and too much. Has this 
>been quantified--X number of data points on a display is just right/too much.
>
>
>Hi Ryan,
>
>Can you tell us anything about the data, the audience for the data, 
>how and where they'll use the data, and any ideas about how the data 
>will be presented? All of these can influence what's optimal.
>
>There may be artful approaches to presenting your data that can help 
>people take in more of it:
>
> 
><http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/08/02/data-visualization-modern-approaches/>http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2007/08/02/data-visualization-modern-approaches/
>
>Jennifer Tidwell talks about some of the issues in a pattern:
>
> 
><http://www.mit.edu/~jtidwell/language/high-density_information_display.html>http://www.mit.edu/~jtidwell/language/high-density_information_display.html
>
>And Tufte may have some useful advice:
>
> 
><http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/books_vdqi>http://www.edwardtufte.com/tufte/books_vdqi
>
>Best,
>
>Mitchell Gass
>uLab | PDA: Learning from Users | Designing with Users
>Berkeley, CA 94707 USA
>+1 510 525-6864 office
>+1 415 637-6552 mobile
>+1 510 525-4246 fax
><http://www.participatorydesign.com/>http://www.participatorydesign.com/
>
>


Mitchell Gass
uLab | PDA: Learning from Users | Designing with Users
Berkeley, CA 94707 USA
+1 510 525-6864 office
+1 415 637-6552 mobile
+1 510 525-4246 fax
http://www.participatorydesign.com/
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