Universal Principles of Design, Revised and Updated

Contour Bias

A tendency to favor objects with contours over objects with sharp angles or points.

When presented with objects that possess sharp angles or pointed features, a region of the human brain involved in fear processing, the amygdala, is activated. Likely a subconscious mechanism that evolved to detect potential threats, this fear response suggests that angular features influence the way in which objects are affectively and aesthetically perceived. Indeed, in experiments where subjects were presented with otherwise similar angled versus contoured objects (e.g., round-faced watches versus square-faced watches), subjects strongly preferred the more rounded, contoured objects. In some of these experiments, brain activity was observed using ...