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Research Supporting the Page Paradigm
As I pointed out on March 8, my recent Good Experience column on the Page Paradigm generated a huge response around the Internet.
Now, to add another viewpoint, a recent study from Wichita State University which states...
Summary: Recent studies have shown that while the use of breadcrumb trails to navigate a website can be helpful, few users choose to utilize this method of navigation.
This behavior, by the way, is exactly what we see in our listening labs, where we observe customers using the Web in as natural an environment as possible. Breadcrumb links certainly don't *hurt* the user experience - they're small and non-distracting - but they also tend not to be the primary elements that customers use to fulfill their goals.
Conversely, merely organizing a site into taxonomies and sub-sections, and displaying breadcrumb links to show the hierarchy of the site, does *not* by itself create a good user experience. There's much more strategic thinking about the business, and the user's relationship to it, that is required. Thus we distinguish the practice of "customer experience" from "usability," "information architecture," and CRM.
Here are the original columns...
The Page Paradigm (February 19, 2004)
Debating the Page Paradigm (March 8, 2004)
