In psychology, salience (from Latin salientia "to jump out") means that a stimulus is more noticeable or more easily accessible to consciousness than a non-salient stimulus.

Together with Selective Attention, salience determines what human attention is focused on.

The salience of a stimulus depends on two factors:

  • its intensity
    This in turn depends on how new or surprising a stimulus is, or how much it stands out from its context or contradicts expectations. Its intensity is therefore dependent on the context and the expectations of the recipient. Stimuli that occur frequently and are already known to the perceiving person are weaker than unknown ones or those that occur rarely.
  • its relevance
    If the stimulus corresponds to an existing biological need or motivation, it is relevant to the perceiving person.

Both factors play a role. If they compete, it is assumed that the intensity of a stimulus, if strong enough, will prevail. The loud bang of an explosion is extremely attention-grabbing, regardless of the biological need or the momentary motivation or perceiving person.

What is the salience effect (also called salience distortion)?

The salience effect occurs when a person pays an extreme amount of attention to something, thereby neglecting other stimuli (which may also be important). Our brain has difficulty paying equal attention to several elements at once, so we focus on what most attracts our attention and neglect other stimuli. To return to the example of the loud bang of an explosion, our brain would give absolute priority to processing this stimulus and would not deal with the other incoming stimuli. We would most certainly no longer understand the content of the sentence we had just read in the book, regardless of how important it was to us.

Origin

In modern research on visual attention, salience plays a central role. An important contribution was made by Anne Treisman and Garry Gelade, who in 1980, with their Feature Integration Theory, showed how "pop-out" effects occur when certain features (such as a strong color contrast change) automatically attract attention. Subsequent work, for example by Laurent Itti and Christof Koch, refined the concept of salience by developing salience maps to predict human eye movements.

  • Treisman, A., & Gelade, G. (1980). A feature-integration theory of attention
  • Itti, L., & Koch, C. (2001). Computational modelling of visual attention

Application in UX and UI design

A specific example of application is the design of call-to-action (CTA) buttons. By using high-contrast colors, eye-catching shapes or animated effects, these buttons stand out from other elements on the page and draw users' attention directly to the desired action, such as "Buy now" or "Learn more".

Another example is the implementation of warning or error messages. By using contrasting colors, eye-catching icons or flashing animations, designers ensure that critical information is immediately noticed, enabling users to quickly respond to potential problems.

By deliberately highlighting important elements such as call-to-action buttons, warning messages or key information, designers can ensure that these elements immediately catch the eye and encourage the desired actions.

Impact on the User Experience

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Further information