How many levels of indents and heads are reasonable?

[Geoff Hart <ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca>]

Krista Van Laan wondered: <<Are there any guidelines anywhere for  
what is a reasonable number of headers and indents?>>

No definitive guidelines, but the "magic number 7" may be appropriate  
here. The basic notion is that working (short-term) memory tends to  
have a sweet spot at around 7 chunks of information for any typical  
group of people. This means that most of us can keep up to 7 items in  
our head simultaneously when we must compare those chunks or work  
with them simultaneously. If you attempt to figure out your position  
within a hierarchy, it seems reasonable that you'd be trying to keep  
all those headings and subheadings and their relationships together  
in one place so you can compare them simultaneously and figure out  
where you are. The more distractions and the more stressed people  
are, the fewer levels they'll be able to grasp.

Is this correct in practice? I wish I could state this with  
certainty, but I can't. It seems reasonable, and it fits my own  
experience with trying to figure out complex heading hierarchies. It  
also fits with a bunch of research articles I've read over the years  
on similar topics (e.g., navigation through Web hierarchies). But it  
simply hasn't been rigorously tested (to my knowledge) specifically  
for heading levels.

Nonetheless, it's clear to me that fewer levels is better than more  
levels, and I've always worked hard to keep my hierarchies to 3  
levels, with a maximum of around 4 levels if pressed. This may not  
always be possible if you're working with a really complex body of  
information, but there are all kinds of tricks you can use to do  
this. If you provide a concrete example of your own heading  
hierarchy, we can probably play with it and help you find something  
simpler.

<<This layout will show up in online help and PDF documents.>>

That introduces a further complication: in print, it's easier to flip  
pages without losing your place if you want to review where you are  
in a hierarchy. I have seen some evidence that more complex  
hierarchies can be comprehended on paper than is possible on the  
screen. But I'd have to do some serious digging to find the articles  
that demonstrate this.


----------------------------------------------------
-- Geoff Hart
ghart -at- videotron -dot- ca / geoffhart -at- mac -dot- com
www.geoff-hart.com
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***Now available***  _Effective onscreen editing_
(http://www.geoff-hart.com/home/onscreen-book.htm)


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