Incorporating Culture in Website Design: A Comparison of Taiwanese and Australian Website Characteristics

Abstract

This paper explores issues related to user interface design and experience, including culturally preferred design elements. A local website audit was conducted to compare and analyze websites in Taiwan and Australia. The web design attributes for effective communication (usability) that are considered include: visual representation, navigation, links, layout and multimedia. Significant differences in culturally preferred design characteristics were found in each of the web design categories. Results from this study can contribute to help web developers and designers develop website designs that are culturally appropriate. Based on the methodology structure in this research, this investigation is the first phase in identifying cultural preferences of two cultures, and future research will evaluate the web experiment design to test if the cultural preferences are incorporated in the web, and to determine if such an approach can improve usability.

Cultural Effects on Metaphor Design

“…Cultural markers [8] cited by [10] are combination of fonts, colors, icons, navigation, images, language and metaphors. Cultural markers reflect the signs of local culture in website.…”

“…The term "culturability" was used by [8] cited by [10] which is combination of "culture" and "usability". They used cultural markers to assist the user.…”

Cultural differences in the context of fast food website design: a comparison of Taiwan and the United States

“…The study examined differences between fast-food chain websites in Taiwan and the U.S. An effort was made to explain differences in terms of Hall's dimensions (1976) and Hofstede's dimensions (2005). The cultural markers considered in this project include visual cues and written text, based on the components proposed by Juric et al (2003) and Hsieh et al (2013).…”

“…Materials for content analysis are screenshots of websites that capture the message and complex context for later analysis (Tsai, 2009). Cultural markers were selected from published reports of previous research (Hsieh et al, 2013;Marcus & Gould, 2000), with revision of cultural markers after formative checking of 10 % -50% of the samples (Mayring, 2000). The screenshots of websites were obtained by the author between September 1 and 10, 2015.…”

“…Taiwanese websites and U.S. websites were examined for the cultural markers proposed by Marcus and Gould (2000) and Hsieh et al (2013). Within a feedback loop, those cultural markers were revised, eventually being formulated to new candidate cultural markers with respect to the fast food chains' websites.…”