An important feature of many personal computing devices, such as laptop computers, tablets, or smartphones, is the capability of running multiple user applications, often simultaneously. For example, a user may read an electronic book, check her calendar, map a route to a particular destination, take photographs, or play a video game from her personal electronic device. At the same time, the user may receive an email, text message, or social network status or be notified of breaking news, a weather update, traffic congestion, or a sports score from her device. Many user applications operating on personal computing devices are configured to provide such notifications, updates, alerts, messages, and similar communications as unobtrusively as possible because the user may find it annoying and/or frustrating if these communications repeatedly diverted the user from another user application that is the focus of the user's attention. However, there may be occasions that the user will miss a critical notification that is presented in too subtle of a manner or mode. In some devices, the user may configure the device and/or the user application to present notifications more overtly. Although the user may be less likely to miss notifications as a result, such approaches can also have its drawbacks, such as disturbing others in the vicinity of the device. In other circumstances, a user configuration may be equally as ineffective in attracting the user's attention as default settings, such as the user configuring the device and/or user application to emit a ringtone or other audio and the user being situated in a noisy environment when her device receives a notification.