Visual Aid research.

Today in IP we had partner discussions about curiosities.  My ideas both involve tackling some kind of language barrier whether it be spoken and written language or visual and auditory disabilities.  Brail and tactile language versus visual language.  Or, auditory and other forms of sensory communication versus visual communication.  In my previous posts I have given some examples of pictograms and isotype that are all fairly simple images.  For Tuesday I want to make a series of instructional or directional graphic images for a trial run of their effectiveness on the class.  Here is some of the research I have done.  Some of these still involve text but are more complex images than simple human forms.

This image is from trucknow.com and a more in depth article can be found here: http://www.aiga.org/content.cfm/keep-on-truckin-with-caution

The following images I found in one of my books "The Information Design Handbook" by Ken and Jenn Visocky O'Grady.  They have some really interesting complex instructional graphics.

This last one I find visually confusing.  I understand why they use a large red "X" but the images  don't seem contained and the "X" is transparent adding more confusion than clarity.  Also, for people who are color blind this would be useless.

This one is from the same book.  It is a Home Heart Difibrolator kit.  I think these graphics are really fantastic.  They are simple, instructive, and text free.

I thought this research was really interesting.  I found this in my book "Wayfinding: Designing and Implementing Graphic Navigational Systems" by Craig Berger.  They took 6 different symbols for "information center" and asked people if they knew what it meant.  The second one to receive 100% of the man pointing at the woman is the one I absolutely would not have gotten.  The "i" I would have understood and the "?" that also received 100% I would have understood.  I think it's a very interesting study.

Next I want to decide on a few instructions for the class to illustrate using graphics only for tuesday.  I want to test my ability to instruct without words, only images.