The Psychology of UIX -- Background Colors for web pages

I get a newsletter from the Brain Lady -- a psychologist named Susan Weinschenk who has built an industry around the psychology of the human brain applied to web design.  I really applaud people who can build significant online revenue streams by leveraging their skills.  She is a speaker, obviously in demand because she has upcoming seminars all around the US and London.

One of the concerns that I have about the information that she promulgates is that she takes psychological studies on the human brain and preaches a 1:1 correlation between a literature review and web design without actually having tested it in real life.  For example, she in one article, she said that the human brain is more comfortable with less choices than more and menu items should optimally have between four and seven choices.  Yet when we wireframe some complex web apps, this is either impossible, or test subjects want more choices to do the tasks that they want and they want those menu choices to be highly explicit.

All this to say, is that the brain information is very interesting, but it all can't be applied uncritically to web design on a 1:1 basis.

Her latest newsletter had the following information about the color of backgrounds.

I came across some interesting research from Mehta and Zhu about red vs. blue background color for screens.

If you are using a negative or fear message it will be more impactful if you use the color red. If you are using a positive message then use blue.
If you want people to do a detail-oriented task use a red background. If you want them to be creative use a blue background.
If you are highlighting detailed features of a product your message will be more persuasive if you use a red background. If you are highlighting concepts of how to use the product then the message will be more persuasive with a blue background.
People prefer blue backgrounds over red, even though red might make them get a task done more quickly. They are not aware of the effects that the colors are having.

Ravi Mehta and Rui (Juliet) Zhu. Blue or Red? Exploring the Effect of Color on Cognitive Task Performances. Sauder School of Business, University of British Columbia, 2053 Main Mall, Vancouver, BC V6T 1Z2, Canada. www.sciencexpress.org / 5 February 2009 / Page 1 / 10.1126/science.1169144

I hope this helps and if someone uses this information, I would appreciate some feedback.  Thanks.

Major UIX Tip -- It's Black and White

If you ware a regular reader of this blog, you know that I have several blogs, and I am constantly experimenting with them as to optimal design to generate the most hits, the greatest user experience and the best UIX or user interface experience.

I decided to experiment with stickability -- how long visitors to the site would stick around for content other than that what brought them there in the first place.  I took two relatively popular blogs, and had one with a black background and one with a white background.

The white background blog continuously outperformed the black one.  After a month, I switched it.  The one that was previously black and now white, suddenly became popular again with more hits.

No one needs more black and white evidence than this.  I had previously opined that a black background on a mobile device acts like a mirror, and that a white background was better.  That was a subjective feeling before.  It appears that it is also an empirical observation now.

The Ultimate Web Page Design ~ The Perfect Web Page

I have seen the future of web design and it is pictured above. It is the ultimate in user experience and usability. It is perfect. It is compatible with every single web-browsing device possible. It has no Flash or fancy layer tricks. It is simple, clean and easily navigable. It has a movie (advanced media) embedded at the bottom. This is the design that all web designers should strive for.

The URL for this perfect website is:

http://web.streetauthority.com/m/tts/TTS05/12-companies-ob-vid.asp

Note: I am not associated in any way with the website, nor did I take a fee to tout this. I am simply in admiration.