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Triggers for cognitive biases for non native English speakers in this site as web-accessibility issues
I dedicate this post to ArtOfCode and Monica;
this is my "I welcome myself" post and I wrote it also based on seven years of experience with StackExchange.
I admit I was a bit lost with the site by means of web accessibility.
English is not my first language so I am more prone to cognitive bias in English user interfaces.
Meta versus non meta
I used Codidact "Meta" several days without even noticing it is different than the "non meta" part of the site; perhaps because I had to put much mental effort in reading the tiny "Codidact" text above the "Meta" text in the logo image and ironically I didn't even notice that "Meta" text - probably because the lack of a psychological scheme towards it (I read "Codidact" with fear - fearing I would confuse "Codidact" with "Codiduct" with which already confused several times; perhaps in the level of a typo).
Today I sat on the bus and executed "Codidact" on Google; I got to the main page which was different than the meta page and because I didn't know that what I used before was meta, I didn't understand I was at "non meta" and asked myself why is the site looks so different and said something might being edited and different parts of the site would be unified under one menu in some time.
I suggest to put links to all network sites (such as "Writing") directly under codidact.org as well as offering a link to Meta from there (it might be easy to navigate directly from browser URL like this - at least in some cases).
Site suggestions
I have suggested 3 new sites without realizing that I must suffice a "2 or more people crew" (or thus I later understood) and thus got a total of eleven down votes.
Down votes are an important quality assurance mechanism but they could happen based on bias (either of the OP, the downvoter, or of both) and in this case, I believe, I was biased to mistake; to clarify:
If a user goes to Codidact meta and clicks on Site suggestions, shehe gets a message that currently has no special design, has no "Red background" ("Red point" principle in marketing of attendance-capturing or make-focusing), no bolding, and it says:
Post here to suggest a new site - if you've got a core group of users interested in having a site here, we can host it for you.
- I am not 100% sure I even noticed that; it might have slipped my mind.
- I vaguely recall I did notice that but I might interpreted "if you've got a core group of users interested in having a site here we can host it for you" as "you may suggest and if your suggestions gets enough attention we start the site"
- I might was biased from my 7 years of using StackExchange
Amount of down votes
I got eleven down votes in about less than a day and that appears about everywhere I go here (and possibly to everyone) and that's a bit strange for me and a bias by itself:
When one gets so many down votes in such a small time frame (even if ironically based on a cognitive bias) it can bring bad emotion that further brings cognitive bias and further biases creating and editing content.
I think, we don't want so much negative emotion here.
I already got about a 1,000 down votes and 750 upvotes on StackExchange so I know a bit about biases in voting.
1 answer
Hey! Welcome to Codidact - we're glad you're here!
Sorry you've had some confusion about the site layout. Qpixel (the current hosting platform) is an interim step to the final form, so a lot of things are definitely under construction. For example, the links at the bottom of each page to other sites are brand new, and should help folks understand the layout just a little bit better.
If you're walking through a construction zone you might need to watch out for dangerous tools or building supplies on the ground. Similarly, Codidact is currently under construction and not everything is labeled and formatted yet, so you might want to take extra time to look around before assuming the sites work in certain ways.
We definitely welcome the criticism though - it helps us improve! :)
To address your negative emotions about the downvotes, try to take them as constructive criticism, not personal attacks. It can certainly be disheartening when people tend to view your contributions in a negative light, but their intention is to guide understanding.
If you have any other questions about the site or things that are unclear, feel free to comment below and we can all attempt a dialogue of understanding.
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