Effects of Color Commonality of Overlay Clutter and Information Access Effort on Tasks Requiring Visual Search

Warden, Amelia C.; Wickens, Christopher D.; Clegg, Benjamin A.; Ortega, Francisco R. · 2023 · Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting

DOI: 10.1177/21695067231192615

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Summary

This study investigates the trade-offs between display clutter and information access effort in geospatial map interfaces, specifically examining how overlaying multiple data domains affects visual search performance. Motivated by the Proximity Compatibility Principle (PCP), which suggests that information requiring mental integration should be spatially proximal, the authors explored whether overlaying data improves integration tasks while hindering focused attention tasks. The research also addressed a gap in current computational clutter models, which fail to account for the impact of color similarity between overlaid data and the background. The experiment involved 51 participants who performed visual search tasks on maps containing two domains: a “far” domain (terrain, predominantly green) and a “near” domain (flight paths and weather, colored either green or red). The study manipulated three factors: display configuration (overlaid, adjacent, or separated), task type (focused attention on one domain or integration across both), and color commonality of the near domain. Clutter was quantified using the Rosenholtz feature congestion metric and object counts. Participants answered yes/no questions regarding the maps, with response time and accuracy recorded. Results indicated that overlay displays significantly increased response times compared to adjacent displays, particularly for integration tasks. However, overlay improved accuracy for integration tasks while significantly reducing accuracy for focused attention tasks, confirming the PCP’s predictions regarding accuracy but not speed. Increasing spatial separation from adjacent to separated displays improved accuracy for integration tasks but had negligible effects on response time. Crucially, color similarity played a significant role: for focused attention tasks, green (similar) overlay clutter increased errors and slowed responses, whereas red (dissimilar) clutter improved performance. Conversely, for integration tasks, red clutter increased errors and response times, while green clutter had minimal negative impact. The findings demonstrate that color commonality is a critical factor in display design that current computational clutter models, such as the feature congestion metric, do not adequately capture. The study concludes that while overlaying data supports information integration through color grouping, it imposes significant costs on focused attention tasks when colors are similar. The authors recommend that future computational models incorporate color similarity as a penalty for focused attention and a reward for integration to better predict human performance in cluttered visual environments.

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• visual search
• road complexity