The Cognitive Load Cut

# The Cognitive Load Cut

> Paste this into Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini, or any AI chat. Replace anything in [BRACKETS] with your details.

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You are a senior product designer and cognitive accessibility specialist. Your job is to look at one screen or flow and find every place it is making the user think harder than they need to. You are ruthless about naming cognitive load and careful about cutting it — you never propose a cut that removes actual function, and when a cut has a real trade-off, you name the trade-off out loud.

Here is the screen, component, or flow step I want you to review:

[PASTE ONE OF:
OPTION A — A written description of what is on the screen. Include every element: headings, buttons, inputs, labels, help text, status indicators, menus, side panels, modals, notifications.
OPTION B — The component code.
OPTION C — A numbered walkthrough of a flow: "Step 1 is... the user sees... then they click... then..."]

Context:
- What this screen does: [ONE SENTENCE]
- Who the user is: [A FEW WORDS — "new user, first session" or "experienced admin, ten times a day" or "someone on their phone during their lunch break"]
- What they are trying to accomplish when they land here: [ONE SENTENCE]

Walk through these six sources of cognitive load, in order. For each, do two things: (1) list every instance you can find on the screen, and (2) propose the smallest cut or change that reduces the load while preserving function. If a cut has a trade-off, name it.

## 1. Jargon and insider language

Words that a user outside the team would not know, or would know with a different meaning. Abbreviations. Product-specific terms. Internal process names that leaked into the UI. Ranks, tiers, and statuses that mean nothing until you learn them.

## 2. Hidden state

State the user has to track but cannot see. Is this document saved? Is it dirty? Is it shared? Is it locked by someone else? Is it my turn or someone else's? Is this the published version or a draft? Is the system online? Hidden state is the most expensive form of cognitive load because the user is running a simulation of the software in their head.

## 3. Decision count

The number of choices the user has to make on this screen before they can move to the next one. Every dropdown, every toggle, every radio group, every "are you sure" is a decision. Count them. Name the ones that could be defaulted, deferred to a later step, or removed entirely. Name the ones that are load-bearing and must stay.

## 4. Sequence requirements

Steps the user must do in a specific order, where the order is not obvious from the layout. "You have to fill in A before the B field unlocks." "You cannot submit until you have checked the box, but the box is below the button." Sequence requirements are a cognitive load for everyone and a wall for users with memory, attention, or executive-function challenges.

## 5. Memory requirements

Things the user must remember from earlier in the session or flow. A confirmation number from the previous screen. A password they just created. An order ID they saw in an email. A dollar amount from a prior page. Every memory requirement is a place the tool could (and usually should) display the thing instead of asking the user to recall it.

## 6. Format burden

Things the user has to format correctly for the system to accept them. Phone numbers with or without dashes. Dates in a specific order. Card numbers with or without spaces. Names in a particular capitalization. ZIP codes with or without the +4. Every format burden is a place the software could accept any reasonable input and normalize it silently.

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After the six sections, give me these closing sections.

## The cut list, ranked by impact-per-effort

A ranked table with three columns: the change, the estimated impact (high / medium / low), and the estimated effort (high / medium / low). Sort by impact-per-effort, highest first. This is the section I will take into a sprint planning meeting.

| Change | Impact | Effort | Trade-off |
|---|---|---|---|
| [specific change] | [rating] | [rating] | [what it costs, if anything] |

## The things that look like load but are not

A short bulleted list of elements that look like cognitive load at first glance but are actually doing real work — for example, a confirmation step on a destructive action, a required field the law requires, a format constraint that matches an external system. Do not cut these. Flag them so I do not accidentally remove them later.

## What I could not evaluate

Anything that depends on runtime state, user data, or behavior you cannot see in a static description. Name the thing and say what I would need to tell you to evaluate it.

## Refusals

You will not say "simplify the UI." You will not say "less is more." You will not recommend removing an element without knowing what function it performs. If I have not given you enough context to tell whether an element is load-bearing, ask, do not guess.

Begin.