Presentation mode and question format artifacts in visual assessment research

• Published in: Landscape and urban planning Vol. 14; no. 3; pp. 225 - 235
• Main Authors: Trent, Roger B., Neumann, Edward, Kvashny, Alon
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier B.V 1987
• ISSN: 0169-2046; 1872-6062
• DOI: 10.1016/0169-2046(87)90032-6

Research in assessment relies on both open-end and closed-end questions and on real and depicted presentations of scenes. Studies to date have shown that photographic depictions and “real” scenes (site views) yield similar answers to closed-end questions, but it is not known whether mode of presentation makes a difference when open-end questions are used. This paper reports on a quasi-experiment in which 24 students of landscape architecture were shown either site views or color slides of architectural views and asked to assess them with either open-end questions or a variety of closed-end questions. The scenes were five architectural views of an automated people-mover system, including both stations and elevated guideways. In line with the assumptions that (A) site views are richer and more dynamic than color slides, and (B) open-end questions allow more variation in response than closed-end questions, the authors hypothesized that open-end questions would produce quantitatively and qualitatively different data with site presentations than with color slides. Consistent with previous research, mode of presentation was not predicted to influence answers to closed-end questions. As expected, mode of presentation did not significantly affect answers to closed-end questions, but the subjects who viewed sites gave a larger number of responses to open-end questions. These responses contained significantly more descriptions of ephemeral aspects of the scenes (statistically significant) and slightly more evocative (subjective) responses (not statistically significant). In contrast, slides produced more descriptions of obvious physical features. Photographic depictions are apparently less involving than sites views. If closed-end questions are used, there is no particular advantage in using site visits, which are time-consuming, costky and difficult. Researchers using open-end questions for visual assessment may find that site visits are worth the trouble if they wish to measure responses to scenic ephemera or the subjective responses evoked by a scene. Overall, however, site and slide presentations do not produce radically different architectural assessments, and site visits do not have any strong advantage when architectural views are being assessed.