Closing

While most of us do enjoy attractive things, the point of all this is to think about the intended effect of our aesthetic choices. Once you understand the effects of different aesthetic choices, you’ll see that it’s entirely possible to make intentional design choices that may seem to lack any sense of style—if you believe that will accomplish a particular behavior goal.

At a fundamental level, our brains are trained to make associations. This is a basic way that we learn and acquire knowledge, leveraging what we already know to make sense of new information. Just as specific words or phrases can trigger an association, so can images.