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# Glanceability
- URL: https://www.lorcandempsey.net/glanceability/
- Published: 2007-05-08T23:29:20.000Z
- Updated: 2020-10-28T09:34:24.000Z
- Author: Lorcan Dempsey
- Tags: UX

Glanceability is about enabling “users to understand information with low cognitive effort”. And further:

> Glanceability refers to how quickly and easily the visual design conveys information after the user is paying attention to the display.

These quotes are from a paper *Designing glanceable peripheral displays* by Matthews, Forlizzi and Rohrbach at Berkeley. \[abstract [html](https://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/2006/EECS-2006-113.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)\] \[full text [pdf](https://www.eecs.berkeley.edu/Pubs/TechRpts/2006/EECS-2006-113.pdf?ref=lorcandempsey.net)\].  
I went looking for further information about glanceability after I came across a mention of it in Tony Hirst’s blog:

> However, whilst the visual component to radio is not just using limited to scrolling liveText displays, nor does it mean moving wholesale into television: the key is to support *glanceability*, a beautifully evocative word referring to the ability to look at a screen and capture the information you require *at a glance*. \[[OUseful Info: Learnin’ from Virgin](https://blogs.open.ac.uk/Maths/ajh59/010272.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)\]

Broadly speaking, it seems to me that effective ranking, for example, supports glanceability, as folks will focus in on top results and may forego individually inspecting each member of a result set. And of course, one of the issues with library websites is that they have low glanceability: they require quite a bit of cognitive effort to figure out what is available where as they present a thin guiding layer wrapped around a resource fragmented by legacy categories.  
I like the visual features of [Worldcat Identities](https://orlabs.oclc.org/Identities?ref=lorcandempsey.net), the timeline and audience level indicator. Each of these provides a hint about a resource, something that conveys quite a bit of information but which requires low cognitive effort to assimilate.  
The timeline gives a nice sense of shifts in reputation or reception of an author over time. Here for example is the timeline of the very popular victorian novelist Edward Bulwer-Lytton \[[wikipedia entry](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward%5FBulwer-Lytton%2C%5F1st%5FBaron%5FLytton?ref=lorcandempsey.net)\]  
[![bulwer.png](https://www.lorcandempsey.net/content/images/wordpress/lorcan/bulwer.png)](https://orlabs.oclc.org/SRW/search/Identities?query=local.pnkey+exact+%22lytton,%20edward%20bulwer%20lytton$baron$1803%201873%22&ref=lorcandempsey.net)  
Although, there is a decline in volume there continues to be interest in re-issuing his novels and some writing about them. One thought is that this may be because of ongoing academic interest. A **glance** at the audience level indicator supports this ….  
[![audience level.png](https://www.lorcandempsey.net/content/images/wordpress/lorcan/audience%20level.png)](https://orlabs.oclc.org/SRW/search/Identities?query=local.pnkey+exact+%22lytton,%20edward%20bulwer%20lytton$baron$1803%201873%22&ref=lorcandempsey.net)  
\[For info on audience level see the [project page](https://www.oclc.org/research/projects/audience/default.htm?ref=lorcandempsey.net).\]  
Related entries:

- [The publication profile of the divine Bohemian](https://blog.oclc.org/lorcand/archives/001285.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)
- [The anxiety of influence](https://blog.oclc.org/lorcand/archives/001271.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)
- [Library websites again](https://blog.oclc.org/lorcand/archives/000600.html?ref=lorcandempsey.net)