Category Archives: Uncategorized

Putting Faces First

After eye tracking a photo of the young man below, we saw how compelling a face could be. Within 3/10 of a second, the 33 people in our pilot study focused on his eyes and mouth. They proceeded to go back and look … Continue reading

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Inner Views: Your Brain on People

We see a space differently with people in the picture; our brain simply directs our attention towards them without any conscious effort on our part. On some level, we may know this, but now with eye-tracking technology we can really … Continue reading

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Bostonians may be hard-wired to hate City Hall Plaza

The Boston Globe took note of our eye-tracking study this Sunday in an IDEAS article. Follow this link or read the article below. The design of Boston City Hall is a charged topic. Some people love it, others hate it, … Continue reading

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How We Look at Buildings

When we look at buildings, what do we see first? What attracts us most? What grabs our attention? Last month, we began a pilot study exploring these questions at Boston’s Institute of Human Centered Design (IHCD) using an off-the-shelf ‘eye-tracker’ … Continue reading

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Why We Love Buildings that Look at Us …

A few months ago, I attended an unusual high school reunion.  It was a special ‘tea’ for the alumnae of a girl’s high school which was getting its first major renovation in more than fifty years—and the grads were invited … Continue reading

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Designing Inside-Out: How Hillary’s Video Grabs your Mind in Milliseconds

Hillary Clinton’s video officially launching her presidential campaign came out last month and we still can’t get enough of it. Why? It’s a picture-perfect demonstration of how the human brain works, what it’s built to focus on, and how it … Continue reading

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Face-i-tecture

Do you see a face in Palladio’s Villa Rotunda? Do the windows on the second floor suggest eyes, and the portico a nose or mouth?  Or maybe the front door behind the columns represents the mouth, and the windows symmetrical about … Continue reading

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