The Psychology of Waiting in Lines

I was poking around the Experientia blog, they had an interesting reference to Don Norman's forthcoming book. One of the chapters on "They Psychology of Waiting Lines" is available for preview - it's awesome (albeit poorly edited). Ironically, coming back from Ottawa a few weekends ago with my family, I was furious about the "line design" and actually said out loud "this would be interesting to study" (they were using a multi-line, multi-cashier model - it was awful).

Here's the Cole's notes: Eight Design Principles for (Designing) Waiting Lines:

1. Emotions Dominate - People believe "Attractive Things Work Better"
   
2. Eliminate Confusion: Provide a Conceptual Model, Feedback and Explanation - Ever wait in a long line, just to find out it's the wrong one?
   
3. The Wait Must Be Appropriate - People accept waits, but it needs to be perceived as appropriate. Tell your workers that customers take priority over counter cleaning!
   
4. Set Expectations, Then Meet or Exceed Them - Tell people how long the line is.
   
5. Keep People Occupied: Filled Time Passes More Quickly Than Unfilled Time - The idea of a "double buffer" for lines: have a staging area to entertain people before they wait in line.
   
6. Be Fair - The optimal "fairness" line is a single line, with multiple cashiers. Interesting note re: multi-line, multi-cashier scenarios: people tend to notice when their lines move slower more than they notice when it's moving faster.
   
7. End Strong, Start Strong - People will even perceive longer lines "better" than shorter ones if the longer line has a "positive" period.
   
8. Memory of an Event Is More Important Than the Experience - Eg. Giving pictures after a roller-coaster.
   

Many of these "waiting line" design principles apply to "designing experiences in general", but specifically to mobile (for the first 4 anyway):

1. Emotions Dominate - Think iPhone, Apple Store experience.
   
2. Eliminate Confusion: Tivo and Ikea have awesome "out of box experiences" with fold out maps.
   
3. The Wait Must Be Appropriate - People expect some work to get their phone up and running, just make it match their expectations.
   
4. Set Expectations, Then Meet or Exceed Them - Apple's getting hammered due to their over-promise of 3G network speeds.