Hick’s Law
By Juan Carlos
Definition
Hick’s Law states that the time required to make a decision increases logarithmically as the number of choices expands. This psychological principle reveals how the complexity of choice directly impacts our decision-making speed and efficiency.
Why Use It
Understanding Hick’s Law transforms our approach to design and decision-making. This framework helps explain why more options don’t always lead to better outcomes, providing a scientific basis for simplification in everything from user interfaces to emergency protocols. It is a powerful tool for creating more efficient and effective choice architectures.
When to Use It
In our choice-abundant world, Hick’s Law has become increasingly relevant. Apply this principle when:
- Designing user interfaces
- Creating emergency procedures
- Structuring menus
- Developing decision protocols
- Planning response systems
- Organizing information hierarchies
- Simplifying complex processes
How to Use It
Jan de Bont’s film “Speed” illustrates this concept through Officer Jack Traven’s decision-making. Like Traven’s split-second choices under extreme pressure – where limited, clear options enable rapid response – we can design systems that facilitate quick, effective decisions:
- Identify essential choices
- Eliminate unnecessary options
- Group related choices logically
- Create clear hierarchies
- Design progressive disclosure systems
- Build in quick-access defaults
How to Misuse It
Hick’s Law isn’t a mandate for oversimplification. Like any design principle, it requires thoughtful application.
Common pitfalls to avoid:
- Oversimplifying complex situations
- Eliminating necessary options
- Creating artificial limitations
- Ignoring context-specific needs
- Applying it uniformly to all situations
- Using it to justify poor design choices
Next Steps
Implementing Hick’s Law requires strategic thinking and careful testing. Think of it as crafting a decision architecture:
- Audit current choice structures
- Map decision pathways
- Identify bottlenecks
- Test different option arrangements
- Measure decision speed and accuracy
- Refine based on user feedback
Where it Came From
William Edmund Hick and Ray Hyman developed this principle in 1952 through their research on the relationship between the number of stimuli present and an individual’s reaction time to any given stimulus. Their work demonstrated that decision time increases logarithmically (not linearly) with the number of choices, revolutionizing our understanding of human-computer interaction and decision theory.