Assessing the usability of icons in user interfaces

This paper presents a methodology and results of an experiment to assess the usability of menu items constructed of text, icons, and text-and-icons. Attributes of menu items are used to form a matrix which can be used to classify menu items for use in certain applications, tasks, or with users of particular experience levels. An experiment was conducted to validate a portion of the attribute matrix. Performance measures were accuracy of selection and time to make a selection. Results suggest that menus constructed of a mixed format (text and icons) result in the fewest number of incorrect selections by users. No significant differences in the time to make a selection were found.