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Cognitive Load

The mental effort a task takes, and reducing the effort that doesn’t help people’s goal.

What is Cognitive Load?

The mental effort a task takes, and reducing the effort that doesn’t help people’s goal.

What you learn

Don’t make people work out what you could just tell them.

When it helps

a simple task feels exhausting, or people must compare or remember too much at once.

Use it at work

  1. Find where people calculate, compare or remember.
  2. Do that work for them where you can.
  3. Show the answer, not the rules.
  4. Remove anything that doesn’t help the decision.

Your output

Find a place where your product makes people add, compare or remember something. Show the answer instead.

Watch for

Making people combine, compare or calculate information the design could state.

Related practices

Sources

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