Test your basic knowledge |

Design Principles

Subject : engineering
Instructions:
  • Answer 50 questions in 15 minutes.
  • If you are not ready to take this test, you can study here.
  • Match each statement with the correct term.
  • Don't refresh. All questions and answers are randomly picked and ordered every time you load a test.

This is a study tool. The 3 wrong answers for each question are randomly chosen from answers to other questions. So, you might find at times the answers obvious, but you will see it re-enforces your understanding as you take the test each time.
1. A tendency to prefer environments with unobstructed views (prospects) and areas of concealment and retreat (refuges).






2. People tend to prefer savanna- like environments to other types of environments. Open areas - scattered trees - water - and uniform grassiness rather than other natural environments such as desert - jungle - and complex mtns.






3. A ratio within the elements of a form - such as height to width - approximating 0.618.






4. When participants realise the aim of the study and may change their behaviour to help or disrupt the study.






5. The usability of a system is improved when its status and methods of use are clearly visible.






6. A strategy for managing information complexity in which only necessary or requested information is displayed at any given time.






7. A tendency to prefer faces in which the eyes - nose - lips and other features are close to the average of a population.






8. A Gestalt principle of organization holding that aspects of perceptual field that move or function in a similar manner will be perceived as a unit






9. Pictures are remembered better than words.






10. The use of more elements than necessary to maintain the performance of a system in the event of failure of one or more of the elements.






11. Elements perceived as either figures (objects of focus) or ground (the rest of the perceptual field)






12. The ratio of face to body in an image that influences the way the person in the image is perceived. (High = intelligent / Low = physical)






13. The process of organizing information into related groupings in order to manage complexity and reinforce relationships in the information.






14. The relative ease with which a destination - idea - or concept may be reached.






15. Successful products typically follow four stages of creation: requirements - design - development - and testing.






16. Memory for recognizing things is better than memory for recalling things.






17. The tendency to see attractive people as more intelligent - competent - moral and sociable than unattractive people.






18. The time it takes to make a decision increases as the number of alternatives increases.


19. Elements that are connected by uniform visual properties - such as color - are perceived to be more related than elements that are not connected.






20. A phenomenon of memory in which items presented at the beginning and end of a list are more likely to be recalled than items in the middle of a list.






21. A technique for bringing attention to an area of text or image.






22. A phenomenon of visual processing in which certain line orientations are more quickly and easily processed and discriminated than other line orientations.






23. A term used to describe a set of data - that when plotted - forms a symmetrical - bell- shaped curve.






24. All products progress sequentially through four stages of existence: introduction - growth - maturity - and decline.






25. A technique used to asociate a stimulus with an unconscious physical or emotional response.






26. Designs should help people avoid errors and minimize the negative consequences of errors when they do occur.






27. A tendency to see objects and patterns as 3D when certain visual cues are present.






28. Repeated exposure to stimuli for which people have neutral feelings will increase the likeability of the stimuli.






29. The debgree to which prose can be understood - based on the complexity of words and sentences.






30. Elements that are similar are perceived to be more related than elements that are dissimilar.






31. A tendency to assume that a system that works at one scale will also work at a smaller or larger scale. (2 kinds: Load assumptions and Interaction assumptions)






32. A relationship between controls and their movements or effects. When th effect corresponds to the expectation - the mapping is considered to be good or natural.






33. Hierarchical organization is the simplest structure for visualizing and understanding complexity.






34. The tendency for people to behave differently when they know they are being studied






35. The act of measuring certain sensitive variable in a system can alter them - and confound the accuracy of the measurement.






36. The ratio of relevant to irrelevant information in a display. The highest possible signal- to- noise ratio is desirable in design.






37. A phenomenon in which mental processing is made slower and less accurate by competing mental processes.






38. An original model on which something is patterned






39. The time required to move to a target is a function of the target size and distance to the target.


40. The tendency to perceive objects as unchanging - despite changes in sensory input. (such as perspective - lighting - color or size)






41. Elements that are close together are percieved to be more related than elements that are farther apart.






42. The usability of a system is improved when similar parts are expressed in similar ways.






43. There are three ways to organize materials to support a load or to contain and protect something: Mass structures - frame structures - and shell structures.






44. Patients experience treatment effects based on their belief that a treatment will work.






45. A space that has territorial markers - opportunities for surveillance - and clear indications of activity and ownership.






46. A property in which a form is made up of parts similar to the whole or to one another.






47. The greater the effort to accomplish a task - the less likely the task will be accomplished successfully.






48. A state of mental focus so intense that awareness of the 'real' world is lost - generally resulting in a feeling of joy and satisfaction.






49. A method of creating imagery - emotions - and understanding of events through an interaction between a storyteller and an audience.






50. Beauty in design results from purity of function. Interpreted in 2 ways: A description of beauty or a prescription for beauty.