Assessing and improving the NWS point-and-click webpage forecast information by Julie L. Demuth, Jeffrey K. Lazo, and Rebecca E. Morss

2012-11

Technical Report

The National Weather Service (NWS) is the governmental agency responsible for providing freely available weather forecasts, warnings, watches, and advisories for the protection of life and property. The point-and-click (PnC) forecast webpage is a primary channel through which NWS directly disseminates everyday and hazardous weather forecast information in graphical and textual formats, with a unique forecast for every 2.5 × 2.5 km grid over land in the United States. Because the PnC webpage provides important - and, at times, potentially life-saving - weather information to its millions of users, it is important that the webpage effectively communicates forecast information. This report details a multi-method research project funded by the NWS that (a) assessed the information provided on the PnC webpage from its users' perspectives and (b) designed and evaluated ways to improve how hazardous weather forecast information is communicated on the PnC webpage. Our research revealed a wealth of empirical data about PnC webpage users' uses of, perceptions of, and preferences for the information as well as ways to improve the webpage information to better serve its users. From the results, we identified 13 overarching, key findings as well as important areas for future research.