I think it's more writing systems (left-to-right vs right-to-left) than
cultural background, especially if the Asians you are talking about happen
to be Asians whose first language has a writing system that is right-to-left
(I couldn't tell if you meant to suggest that to be true, or if you were
assuming that we would think that -- not a safe assumption: lots of Asians
have writing systems that are left-to-right).

Re handedness: there might be something there (usability testing we've done
on enhanced TV interfaces suggests that viewers like navigation on the right
because it kinda/sorta mimics hardware controls on TV sets -- those that
still have them), but wouldn't that mean that most people would rather see
navigation on the right?

 -- Jose Arcellana

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Barry Caplan [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
> Sent: Tuesday 07 March 2000 17.04
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Layout of screens and tabbing
>
>
> A colleague asks:
>
>
> ------------
> This morning, I was in a meeting in which we were talking
> about tabs and
> navigation through a set of screens. From the usability
> perspective, it's a
> standard to include navigation function across the top or
> down the left side.
> The only two people who disagreed happened to be Asian. They
> argued that they
> much preferred to start from the right hand side of the
> screen rather than the
> left.
>
>
> Is this a cultural issue? Is it a handedness issue? Is there
> any data about
> the
> location of items on the screen relative to cultural background?
> -------------
>
>
> Can anyone shed some light on this?
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> Barry
>