PSYCHOLOGY OF ONSCREEN TYPE: INVESTIGATIONS REGARDING TYPEFACE PERSONALITY, APPROPRIATENESS, AND IMPACT ON DOCUMENT PERCEPTION A Dissertation by Audrey Dawn Shaikh Master of Arts, Wichita State University, 2005 Master of Science, University of North Texas, 1999 Bachelor of Science in Education, Baylor University, 1992 Submitted to the Department of Psychology and the faculty of the Graduate School of Wichita State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy May 2007 © Copyright 2007 by Audrey Dawn Shaikh All Rights Reserved PSYCHOLOGY OF ONSCREEN TYPE: INVESTIGATIONS REGARDING TYPEFACE PERSONALITY, APPROPRIATENESS, AND IMPACT ON DOCUMENT PERCEPTION I have examined the final copy of this dissertation for form and content, and recommend that it be accepted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy with a major in Human Factors Psychology. ____________________________________________ Barbara S. Chaparro, Committee Chair We have read this dissertation and recommend its acceptance: ____________________________________________ Paul Ackerman, Committee Member ____________________________________________ Alex Chaparro, Committee Member ____________________________________________ Darwin Dorr, Committee Member ____________________________________________ Michael Jorgensen, Committee Member Accepted for the College of Liberal Arts & Sciences __________________________________________________________ William D. Bischoff, Dean Accepted for the Graduate School __________________________________________________________ Susan K. Kovar, Dean iii DEDICATION To the spirits I cherish and the hands I hold… Aneesa & Amara for their amazing patience, support, and the never-ending supply of “you can do it” notes and reminders. Thank you both for believing in me and for pushing me along the way! Most of all to Moin who has made my life easier than I ever thought possible and has supported me in all ways through his dedication as a parent to our peeps, as my bestest friend, and as more than a partner in all ways. Without your help with the house, kids, school, my internship, crazy schedules, so much more, I could never have done this. Thank you for being my shoulder, my rock, my sanity, my everything. I look forward to our next journey together when I have a full(er) person to give back to all three of you. I love you all lots and am so happy you are in my life! iv The secret of type is that it speaks. ‐Paul Claudel v ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS My graduate career has benefited from the support, friendship, and knowledge of many people. Such an endeavor is only possible through the selfless acts of countless people who educate, share, and encourage one another. I would like to acknowledge the support of my family (big and small). My parents, who may still not fully understand why I have been in school for most of the last 19 years, have always supported me and believed in me. I would like to thank them all for allowing me to walk down my own path. I would especially like to thank my mom, Jean, for always being strong and determined. You have inspired me in many ways and continue to do so every day. I think my journey to the PhD arena started at your college graduation when I fell in love with the tams and hoods. I would also like to thank my sister, Gina, for her enormous faith in me. She has patiently assisted with dispersing all of my dissertation studies and has given me invaluable feedback, friendship, and support throughout my graduate work. To everyone else in my big family: thanks! The steady emails, phone calls, and support while I continued through my program (especially this last leg) were much appreciated. Throughout my education, there have been many professors who have shared their knowledge with me and to all of them I say thank you! In particular, the members of my committee have all influenced my education in many ways. Dr. Ackerman thanks for letting me teach the courses I was interested in and thanks for always smiling! It was during Dr. Dorr’s personality class that I first began researching the perception of typefaces, and he assisted me in many ways. I also appreciate your genuine interest in my topic. I would like to thank Dr. Alex Chaparro for always encouraging me to strive for excellence in my vi studies. The rigor of your classes and your passion about the topics were truly inspiring. I also appreciate your willingness to provide honest feedback on my writing over the years. Even though I only experienced one class with Dr. Jorgensen, I was quickly motivated by you to get real‐world experience. I thoroughly enjoyed the stories and experiences you shared with us in class. I hope to follow your example of industry‐first, academics‐later. It has also been a pleasure to take several classes from Dr. Halcomb. I miss you and all your words of wisdom. Thank you for always letting me interrupt you and for all the help you have given me over the years on statistics‐sort‐of‐stuff. Although not on my committee, I would like to thank Dr. Gerald Knezek (UNT) for his continued support of my graduate work and help right up until the end. Microsoft researcher, Kevin Larson, gave us the opportunity to start this line of research and has over the years become a friend, thanks Kevin! Finally, I would like to thank the woman that made it all happen for me, Dr. Barbara Chaparro. Thank you for all the opportunities, trust, and responsibility you have given me during my WSU days. I appreciate your midnight emails (I would like to say they have ended, but…) and your patience with me that never ended. The experience working in SURL has been so rewarding and confirmed that HCI was just the field for me. My future career endeavors will be exactly what you have allowed me to make them. You are a role model for me in many ways and your willingness to teach me has impacted my life forever. While family members have supported me and professors have educated me, it has been a handful of friends who have kept me sane. Thank you to Mark Russell and Ryan Baker for first taking me into their super‐secret‐sorta‐British society when I was a first year. You guys made me laugh, listened to me “rant,” and taught me a bunch. Thank you to my colleagues, Jeremy Slocum and Shelby Thompson, who made me a better student by vii having such high standards and by occasionally engaging in friendly competition! Thank you Shelby for always taking time to discuss statistics and such. To the women (Darcee, Jane, Marci, Judy, & Carrie) who love me just the way I am and who are always willing to listen – thank you! Doug Fox has also been a life‐saver time and time again as we have worked together on many projects. Thanks for returning library books for me, for always being willing to pilot, and for proofreading papers at a moment’s notice. Keep on making me proud! Finally a big thank you to Shannon Riley and Rochelline Marshall for their constant friendship and support. You have both given me many words of advice and provided me with hours of entertainment over the years! Friends like you guys make life so much more doable. I sincerely appreciate your support during all my crazy periods. Now, with all due respect, you guys hurry up and get‐r‐done! To all the people who have taken care of my little peeps so I could stay in school, thank you! And to all of my fellow students who have helped with my research, thanks! As my life heads down a new path, I would like to thank Google’s User Experience Research group for taking me on as an intern! Rick, thank you a million times over for bringing me out West and providing me the chance to be a Googler. Thanks to Michael for all of his help over the past few months in preparation of me joining the NW team. Since my internship ended, I have stayed in constant touch with Phil working on papers and supporting each other as we work on dissertations; thanks Phil… tag! And then there’s Adam, THE stats geek! Thanks so much for always providing me in‐depth answers! There were many aspects of my dissertation research that were made much easier thanks to the help of random strangers from the Internet. Thanks to Jon Peltier who sent me step‐by‐step instructions for creating semantic differential charts in Excel. This saved viii me a ton of time and enabled me to figure out how to create the Thurstone scale scores. I would also like to thank Dr. Jeff Sloan, Dr. Lesley Degner, and Ruth Bond for an enormous amount of help with the Thurstone scale scores. Dr. Sloan’s willingness to go over my scales and discuss them with me via phone was so kind and greatly appreciated. Finally several people assisted me in my quest to get third‐order approximation to English text. Tim Ahrens from ATypI sent me a database for validation purposes. Both Ján Suchal and Benjamin Servoz gave me access to their n‐gram generators. Ján even crunched an entire 10 chapters of a book for me. Benjamin uploaded a list generator and gave me free access to it. I have learned throughout my research that it never hurts to ask for help! And sometimes help comes from total strangers… isn’t the Internet a wonderful place! Finally, I would like to thank Benton and Wanda Cain. I would not be where I am if you had not both taken the time to help me apply to Baylor way back when! Thank you for seeing something in me that I did not know was there.