Votes go to Morphed Images that look most like the Voter, finds Study

"Facial Identity Capture and Presidential Candidate Preference" by Jeremy N. Bailenson, Shanto Iyengar, and Nick Yee of the Department of Communication, Stanford University concludes with the startling revelation that the 2004 US elections could have gone a different way if Kerry had been using facial identity capture software.

'By altering pictures of Kerry and Bush to capture features of potential voters, we manipulated the outcome of the 2004 Presidential election,' say the authors. 'We utilized pixel blending software to examine facial identity capture, making one person’s face appear more similar to someone else’s.'

One week before the 2004 presidential election, participants completed a survey of their attitudes concerning George Bush and John Kerry while viewing photographs of both candidates side by side. For a random one-third of the subjects, their own faces were morphed with Kerry while unfamiliar faces were morphed with Bush. For a different one-third, their own faces were morphed with Bush while unfamiliar faces were morphed with Kerry. The remaining one-third of the sample viewed un-morphed pictures of the candidates.

Participants were more likely to vote for the candidate morphed with their own face than the candidate morphed with an unfamiliar face. The use of facial identity capture was sufficient to change the outcome of the presidential election by a double-digit margin, according to a national random sample.

"Facial Identity Capture and Presidential Candidate Preference" was presented at the 55th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association.

Associated Link: Facial Identity Capture and Presidential Candidate Preference

All change at the top for System Concepts
Source: System Concepts Ltd, 3 July 2009
 
Leslie Fountain has been promoted to joint Managing Director of leading usability consultancy System Concepts.

Life in UCD immortalised in fiction: you couldn't make it up
Source: UN, 2 July 2009
 
Sarah Herman's fictitious book on life in a user-centred design company has hit the shelves and The Guardian's book pages...

Interfaces Magazine - Issue 79: The Education Issue
Source: Interaction Group, 1 July 2009
 
The latest issue of Interfaces is now available as a free download from the Interaction Website.

Two new Behavioural research Tools from Noldus
Source: UN, 30 June 2009
 
Tool updates make on-site behavioural data collection easier.

Cell Phones that Listen and Learn
Source: MIT Technology Review, 29 June 2009
 
New software tracks a user's behavior by monitoring everyday sounds.

Top Six Don’ts for Usability Testing
Source: FutureNow Inc., 27 June 2009
 
Six tips for creating quality usability tests to ensure useful feedback from testers.

Usability: ‘Lovely software. But I can’t work it’
Source: FT.com, 26 June 2009
 
In a recent survey by Global Graphics, 77 per cent of office workers estimate they lose up to one hour a week because business software is difficult to use.

And what do you do?
Source: Dexo Design, 25 June 2009
 
How do you describe your job role? Here are the results of a recent 'Preferred UX/UI Title' Poll.

Most Doctors cite Usability as critical to Electronic Health Record Adoption
Source: TMCNet, 24 June 2009
 
It's all about 'meaningful use'.

Glossy monitors look good but can hurt
Source: QUT, 23 June 2009
 
A new advisory cites research which suggests high gloss monitors make users sit awkwardly.