Design Atlas⌘UX terms & laws
Fitts’s law, affordance, progressive disclosure — UX concepts you hear in meetings, shown by example. — 53 entries
Tesler's Law테슬러의 법칙
Every process carries a fixed amount of complexity — it can be moved between system and user, but never truly removed.
Postel's Law포스텔의 법칙
Be conservative in what you send, liberal in what you accept — interfaces should tolerate varied input but emit only clean, consistent output.
Pareto Principle파레토 법칙
Roughly 80% of effects come from 20% of causes — an empirical rule first observed by economist Vilfredo Pareto in land-ownership data.
Occam's Razor오컴의 면도날
Among explanations — or designs — that reach the same result, the one with the fewest assumptions should win.
Parkinson's Law파킨슨의 법칙
Work expands to fill the time allotted for its completion — a longer deadline just produces a longer task.
Choice Overload선택 과부하
Too many options can make people abandon the decision entirely, or feel less satisfied with what they pick — fewer jams sold more jam.
Anchoring Effect앵커링 효과
The first number you see becomes the reference point for every judgment that follows — show the original price first, and the sale price feels cheaper.
Social Proof사회적 증거
Evidence that others already did something makes you more likely to do it too — review counts and live user numbers are the classic cue.
Scarcity Effect희소성 효과
A signal that supply or time is limited pushes people to act now — "only 2 left in stock" is the textbook case.
Friction — good vs bad프릭션 (좋은 마찰 vs 나쁜 마찰)
Anything that slows a user down. Some friction prevents costly mistakes; the rest just wastes time for no reason.
Default Effect디폴트 효과
People overwhelmingly stick with whatever is pre-selected — whether a choice defaults to opt-in or opt-out swings the outcome dramatically.
Framing Effect프레이밍 효과
The same fact is judged differently depending on how it's worded — "90% fat-free" reads better than "10% fat," even though they're identical.
Decoy Effect디코이 효과
Adding a deliberately unattractive third option to make one of the other two look like the obvious best deal.
Endowed Progress Effect보유 진행 효과
A head start — even a fake one — boosts motivation to finish. A 2-of-10 stamp card gets completed faster than a 0-of-8 card, though both need 8 more stamps.
Recognition Over Recall회상보다 재인
Don't make users remember — let them recognize. Options visible on screen are found faster and more accurately than ones recalled from memory.
Law of Common Region공통 영역의 법칙
Elements sharing a bounded region — a border, background, or card — are perceived as one group, even without proximity.
Law of Prägnanz프레그난츠의 법칙
Faced with an ambiguous shape, the brain resolves it to the simplest, most regular form it can — even filling in edges that aren't there.
Selective Attention선택적 주의
Focus on one thing hard enough, and something plainly visible slips right past unnoticed. Not because it was invisible — because attention was elsewhere.
Banner Blindness배너 블라인드니스
Anything that looks like an ad slot gets scanned right past — regardless of what's actually in it.
Paradox of the Active User능동적 사용자의 역설
People almost never read the manual first — even knowing it would make them more efficient — and dive straight into trial and error instead.
Fitts's Law피츠의 법칙
The farther and smaller a target is, the longer it takes to reach. Keep important targets close and large.
Hick's Law힉의 법칙
The more choices you offer, the longer it takes to decide. A long menu slows the decision, not just the scan.
Jakob's Law야콥의 법칙
Users spend most of their time on other sites, so they expect yours to work the same way. Novel layouts must be relearned every time.
Miller's Law밀러의 법칙
Short-term memory holds only about 7±2 items (some readings say ~4). Group information into chunks to fit.
Affordance어포던스
The property of an object's form that suggests how it can be used — a raised, shadowed button visually says "press me."
Signifier시그니파이어
An affordance nobody notices is useless — a signifier is the explicit signal (arrow, label, icon) that tells you what to do.
Progressive Disclosure점진적 공개
Show only the essentials first, and reveal advanced options only on request.
Empty State빈 상태
The screen you see when there's no data yet. Instead of leaving it blank, explain why it's empty and what to do next.
Microinteraction마이크로인터랙션
A tiny, contained interaction that does one small thing — like a like-button that bounces when tapped.
Optimistic UI옵티미스틱 UI
Update the screen as if the server call already succeeded, without waiting for the response — roll back only if it fails.
Dark Pattern다크 패턴
UI deliberately designed to trick or pressure users into a choice that benefits the business over them — pre-checked subscriptions, guilt-trip copy.
F-PatternF 패턴
On text-heavy pages, eyes scan wide across the top, then narrower across a second line, then drift down the left edge — tracing an F.
Z-PatternZ 패턴
On sparse, visual-first pages, the eye moves top-left → top-right → diagonally down → bottom-left → bottom-right, tracing a Z.
Visual Hierarchy비주얼 하이어라키
Using size, weight, colour, and position to create a viewing order. Emphasise everything and nothing stands out.
Gestalt: Proximity게슈탈트: 근접성
Elements placed close together are perceived as one group — spacing alone creates groups, no border needed.
Gestalt: Similarity게슈탈트: 유사성
Elements sharing colour or shape read as one group, even when they aren't physically close together.
Gestalt: Closure게슈탈트: 폐쇄성
The brain fills in missing pieces to perceive a complete shape — even when the outline is literally broken.
Figure-Ground전경-배경
The eye splits any scene into a foreground shape and a background — and which is which can flip depending on colour and contrast.
Aesthetic-Usability Effect심미적 사용성 효과
A design that looks more polished is perceived as easier to use — even when its actual usability is identical.
Von Restorff Effect폰 레스토프 효과
An item that stands out from a group of similar items is disproportionately noticed and remembered.
Serial Position Effect계열 위치 효과
People remember the first and last items in a list far better than the middle ones — a U-shaped recall curve.
Peak-End Rule피크엔드 법칙
People judge an experience by its most intense moment and its ending — not by the average of every moment.
Doherty Threshold도허티 임계값
Keep system response under 400ms and users stay in flow; go slower and attention drifts elsewhere.
Zeigarnik Effect자이가르닉 효과
Unfinished tasks linger in memory far more than completed ones. It's why a progress bar nudges people to finish.
Goal-Gradient Effect목표 기울기 효과
Motivation and effort speed up the closer you get to a goal. It's why loyalty-card stamps fill in faster near the end.
Mental Model멘탈 모델
The belief a user already carries about how something should work. When the system behaves differently, confusion follows.
Cognitive Load인지 부하
The total mental effort required to understand and use a screen. Higher load means more errors and more drop-off.
Coach Marks코치 마크
An onboarding overlay that dims the screen and spotlights one element at a time, walking users through in sequence.
Above the Fold어보브 더 폴드
The area visible without scrolling. The term comes from a folded newspaper's top half — what you see on the newsstand.
Call to Action콜투액션
The button or line of copy that points to the next action you want the user to take. A weak CTA gets ignored; a strong one pulls the eye.
Touch Target터치 타깃
The minimum size a control needs to be reliably tapped with a finger. Apple recommends 44×44pt, Material Design 48×48dp.
Perceived Performance체감 성능
How fast something feels, not how fast it actually is. The same total wait can feel very different depending on how it's shown.
Skeleton Screen스켈레톤 스크린
Grey placeholder blocks shaped like the content that's about to load, shown before the real thing arrives — it shortens perceived wait time versus a blank screen.