Need: How PowerPoint Adversely Mediates Thought and Possible Remedies

No communication technology is a simple conduit for information.PowerPoint inevitably mediates; it shapes the presenter’s message. The verdict of Edward Tufte and other popular commentators is that PowerPoint’s “cognitive style” is to “dumb down ideas and make us stupid.” Although Tufte’s attack on PowerPoint is deeply flawed, PowerPoint does distort the visual representation of the presenter’s logical hierarchy-primarily by flattening hierarchies. The main reason is that the slide metaphor (which forces content to be displayed in discontinuous chunks) and the presence of slide titles in almost all the default slide layouts jointly create an upward vector in the representation of logical hierarchies that presenters have difficulty managing. Flattened hierarchies (along with other kinds of distortion) are problematic when audiences are processing complex or unfamiliar information, and they invite presenters to avoid making careful distinctions in their own thinking. Fortunately, these adverse mediational effects can be addressed through better deck design and through changes in the PowerPoint application.