Article about Itch Scratching Research featured on Science Daily is an exemplary model of all four PICK concepts

Featured research article “Why scratching makes you itch more,” is an excellent example of all four PICK Concepts. The article features personalized language that engages the reader, and a contiguous graphic that provides readers with an easy to understand breakdown of the neurological processes behind itching. Reducing the scientific language to a format that readers are more likely to understand helped to minimized kick-outs. The article includes less interactive material, yet remains one of the best articles that displays all four concepts.

Diagram for brain process after an itch is easy to understand and contiguous with text.

            The graphic included in the itch-scratching article is a model that displays visually how the brain processes the act of scratching an itch. The color-coding of the arrows and the bold faced words are pleasing to the eye and reduce cognitive stress, making the graphic much easier for readers to process. The graphic alone provides a great abbreviated version of the brain process that would provide enough information to someone who didn’t read the article how the brain processes an itch-scratch.  The caption aids processing and increases contiguity by explaining the graphic in greater detail and relating it to the text.

Personalized language helps to engage readers to learn about this already personalized concept.

            The principle of relativity is a psychological phenomenon that explains students learning and understanding increases when the information can be directly related to the student. The principle of relativity is a fundamental concept of a personalized article and is utilized in this article to personalize the material. The article used phrases like “makes you itch more” and “your mom was right.” This personalized language engages readers in the material, causing readers to instinctively search for deeper meaning within the material, facilitating a deeper understanding of the material. The concept of itch scratching is already a concept that everyone is familiar with, and the increased familiarity of the topic also enhances learning.

More familiar and simpler language reduces cognitive load and minimizes Kick-Outs.

            The article replaces difficult scientific terminology with much simpler and easy-to-understand language to reduce cognitive processing, which helps readers to learn more and also allows them to finish reading the article. Language that is difficult to understand is a major potential kick out, since most people don’t want to read an article full of words they cannot understand. This article does a terrific job of minimizing scientific language. For example, the article uses phrases like “pain signals” and “itch signals” instead of including the specific neurotransmitter and cellular receptor that distinguish the pathway for those signals. The article also uses words like “carry” instead of axonal transport, and “sensation” instead of physiological response. There are several other scientifically intense words that have been refrained from usage in this story.

Sharing options and graphic display minimal interactivity, which is still better than nothing.

Finding an article that includes all four PICK concepts is incredibly difficult, especially since a lot of articles that come close often go overboard with contiguous graphics and animation and interactive design; this often causes cognitive overload, which is a major kick out. The examples of interactivity in this model are the social media sharing options, a tab on the left side that allows you to share the article over the web using different social media accounts and other forms of communication, and also the option to enlarge the graphic. The examples are amazing for interactivity, but adding any interactive material to this would have been excessive. I think the article is simple, to the point, and efficient. It tells readers what they need to know and give them exactly enough resources to understand the material and to provide the option to seek further information if they really wanted to. Overall, I think this article is an excellent example of the PICK model .