One suggestion that I read recently (MacEachren "How Maps Work" Fig 3.30, attributed to Wertheimer) for why some of those sorting examples make patterns more visible is that they allow Gestalt Similarity and Gestalt Proximity to work in concert rather than in opposition. For example, the heatmap (with sorting) places the cells with similar colours closer together in space. Without sorting, the colours suggest a grouping that is inconsistent with the group suggested by spatial proximity. Of course, that is not something inherent to sorting, but it may help to explain why sorting is sometimes effective.
Interesting observation. My intuition is that chunking effects take place. Sorting creates higher level structure and this structure makes processing information easier. Another way to express this idea is that the number of objects you have to process get smaller because you can group some objects together. When I sort a bar chart, I no longer need to compare all bars, I can just follow the order. When I sort a heat map I can process the grouping that emerge instead of individual rows and columns. I agree with you completely that often this grouping effect if achieved by the interplay of proximity and similarity. This is a fantastic observation! It's true for many of the examples I included in the post. Thanks for sharing this idea with me. You made me think about this problem on a deeper level and I am even more convinced now that this should be studied way more formally.
A great read! Thank you.
One suggestion that I read recently (MacEachren "How Maps Work" Fig 3.30, attributed to Wertheimer) for why some of those sorting examples make patterns more visible is that they allow Gestalt Similarity and Gestalt Proximity to work in concert rather than in opposition. For example, the heatmap (with sorting) places the cells with similar colours closer together in space. Without sorting, the colours suggest a grouping that is inconsistent with the group suggested by spatial proximity. Of course, that is not something inherent to sorting, but it may help to explain why sorting is sometimes effective.
Interesting observation. My intuition is that chunking effects take place. Sorting creates higher level structure and this structure makes processing information easier. Another way to express this idea is that the number of objects you have to process get smaller because you can group some objects together. When I sort a bar chart, I no longer need to compare all bars, I can just follow the order. When I sort a heat map I can process the grouping that emerge instead of individual rows and columns. I agree with you completely that often this grouping effect if achieved by the interplay of proximity and similarity. This is a fantastic observation! It's true for many of the examples I included in the post. Thanks for sharing this idea with me. You made me think about this problem on a deeper level and I am even more convinced now that this should be studied way more formally.