Design Features of Graphic Symbols Varying in Interpretability

Abstract

10 of the graphic symbols designed by Henry Dreyfuss Associates for Deere and Company farm and industrial machinery were presented to 30 mechanical engineering majors for interpretation in context and in isolation. Approximately half of the 15 subjects in each condition had specific prior experience with the type of machinery for which the symbols were intended. Individual symbols were differentially affected by the two factors of context and experience, but relative ease of recognition among the symbols as a set persisted unchanged. Specific design features of the symbols were examined in an attempt to account for their variation in interpretability. While pictorial and “grammatical” aspects were involved, the more successful symbols were distinguished primarily by being representations of commonplace rather than technological objects and actions.