{"id":3987,"date":"2020-04-28T17:05:11","date_gmt":"2020-04-28T17:05:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/uxmag.com\/?p=3987"},"modified":"2022-04-29T15:29:41","modified_gmt":"2022-04-29T15:29:41","slug":"salience-the-psychology-of-an-experience-you-cant-ignore","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/uxmag.com\/articles\/salience-the-psychology-of-an-experience-you-cant-ignore","title":{"rendered":"Salience: The psychology of an experience you can\u2019t ignore"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cNobody counts the number of ads you run; they just remember the impression you make.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2013 Bill Bernbach<\/p>\n

The operations team at Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam had a problem. No matter how many times a day the janitorial team made the rounds, the men\u2019s urinals were always a mess.<\/p>\n

As many a mother, partner, and bathroom floor can attest, men often lack \u201curinary precision\u201d. In public toilets, the mess caused by hundreds of misses can be unsanitary and expensive to clean. Schiphol Airport solved their problem with a simple but brilliant solution.<\/p>\n

They placed an etching of a fly inside each urinal bowl.<\/p>\n

\n
\"Fly<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Source: Google Images<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

These tiny engravings were incredibly effective. The flies reduced spillage<\/a> by 80% and total cleaning costs<\/a> by 8%. As Klaus Reichardt, a member of the team who invented the solution put it:<\/p>\n

\u201cGuys are simple-minded and love to play with their urine stream, so you put something in the toilet bowl and they\u2019ll aim at that.<\/em><\/p>\n

It could be anything. I\u2019ve seen a golf flag, a bee, a little tree. It just happens that at Schiphol it\u2019s a fly.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

But why did such a simple solution work so well? It\u2019s down to a behavioral science principle known as salience bias<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

What is Salience Bias?<\/h3>\n

Salience<\/strong><\/a> describes how prominent or emotionally striking something is. If an element seems to jump out from its environment, it\u2019s salient. If it blends into the background and takes a while to find, it\u2019s not. Salience Bias<\/strong><\/a> states that the brain prefers to pay attention to salient elements of an experience.<\/p>\n

Salience describes the prominence or emotional resonance of an element.<\/em><\/p>\n

What makes something salient?<\/h3>\n

Salience works by creating what\u2019s called cognitive ease<\/strong><\/a>. This concept means making it simple for people to process information. But to do that, we need to know what elements make an experience salient. For instance:<\/p>\n

1. Luminance<\/strong><\/h5>\n

The intensity of light emitted from an object. For example, a glowing effect around an element will make it stand out from the background.<\/p>\n