Sequential and Simultaneous Presentations of Information I. Is there a difference?

Mats Lind

Sequential and Simultaneous Presentations of Information I. Is there a difference? Mats Lind Report no. 16 from Uppsala University Center for Human-Computer Studies, Uppsala, Sweden.

Abstract

In decision making different presentations of relevant data may influence how quickly a correct decision is made. One way in which presentations of data can vary is whether the relevant data are available simultaneously or sequentially to the decision maker. Field studies and results obtained in the area of control room design indicate that simultaneous presentations lead to faster decisions. Since computers are increasingly being used to provide data to decision makers, and computer presentations of data on VDUs tend to be sequential, these indications need to be investigated further. An analysis of the two forms of presentation provided six possible explanations of the observed superiority of simultaneous presentations and three of these are tested in an experiment. The results show that in the choosen task the simultaneous presentation do lead to substantially shorter decision times and that this effect cannot be explained neither by the delays usually present in computer-based sequential presentations nor by the inherent property of sequential presentations to leave the spatial relations between different pieces of information undefined.