Chris Harrison points out that „research has shown that the perceived duration of progress bars can be manipulated by changing how they move (e.g., pauses, accelerations)“ (http://www.chrisharrison.net/index.php/Research/ProgressBars2)

In the following video the visualization of the different progress bars and menues is shown: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CDnN3wLY3OE

Visualization by Harrison et al.:

• Duration: 5 seconds
• Start frequency: 1.1 Hz
• End frequencies: 1.1 Hz, 1.17 Hz, 1.25 Hz, 0.95 Hz, 0.8 Hz
• 25 combinations to test all possibilities

• 20 participants (same participants as in study 1)
• seven ribbed behaviors
• same study interface
• 49 distinct ordered pairs of the seven ribbed behaviors
• testing behaviors against themselves, and both orderings of any given pair
• randomized presentation order

• 10 participants (5 female, mean age 19)
• relative perceived duration of the three progress bars at two different durations, 5 and 15 seconds
• each unique ordered pair of progress bars was presented to participants twice, for a total of 18 trials
• data from repeated trials was combined
• trial order was also randomized
• study was completed for both 5- and 15-second durations (36 comparisons in total) using the same interface as the previous two studies

• 16 participants (6 female, mean age 22)
• eight rounds to find a perceptual equilibrium for each of the four conditions
• repeated twice (with data averaged together) for a total of 64 trials
• time that was added or subtracted to the ribbed progress bar duration decreased linearly each round, allowing for increasingly fine tuning
• value started at 25% of the total original duration, and then dropped by 5% each subsequent round