Usability: Where do users focus their initial attention on in new interfaces?

Question

I know there was a study somewhere that showed which places users focused on initially when presented with new interfaces, but I can't remember that study, nor remember exactly what behaviors could be assumed for most users of your program.

From what I do remember, it came down that users often shoot towards the corners of a software application, looking for context to help them make their decisions on how to use the interface, but I don't know that as a hard fact, and would like to find some resource that outlines some of these common usability rules.

Does anyone know the study I'm talking about, or could cite any sources that describe something similar to the above?

Answer 1

Are you talking about things like this, with the classic 'F' pattern in using the web?

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/reading_pattern.html

Answer 2

• This post discusses the focus of user attention in new interfaces.
• Here is a related presentation on designing effective user interfaces.

Answer 3

My first response on reading this question is: What do you mean by initial? Do you mean the impression the user gets in the first second? Ten seconds? Ten minutes? There have been many eye tracking and "information grouping" studies done, but you can always fall back to the good old Gestalt principles ... people will group information and focus on what is most prominent.

Another good article from useit.com:

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/timeframes.html.

And there are a lot of good studies linked from there. =)