In product design today, there are a variety of design methodologies which can come into play. In some organizations, people focus on experience-based design, but they are typically talking about the experience of interacting with the product, not the experience of accomplishing some derivative goal. Or, there are the schools centered around the concept of efficiency of design, or completing the task as quickly as possible so that you can move onto other tasks. Some folks like go with a minimalist approach so that you can stay focused on the task at hand, while others (this is particularly true in software) like to load up the "interface" with as much information or interaction points as possible so you can do the most work from the fewest locations.
All of these approaches have merit, to be sure, but what if we strip away a couple of layers and think about what lies beneath. Why do people use products in the first place?
I am sure there are several books on the psychology of product utilization, but I think we can easily sum it up into a couple broad concepts:
- The individual derives physical or emotional satisfaction (pleasure?) from the product or by using the product to complete some task.
- The individual is forced to use the product under penalty of some negative consequence.
Even simpler? You either want to use it, or you have to use it.
That's pretty straightforward as a general concept, and yes, it is an oversimplification, but it can be applied to most anything. For example, televisions. You either have a top-of-the-line A/V system with high-definition and 7.1 surround sound which was professionally installed in your custom-designed home theater with stadium-style seating, or you have the TV that you could afford that sits in your family room in front of your off-the-shelf couch. How is this an example?
Well, in the first setup, you have the satisfaction of knowing you have the best audio/video experience your money could buy. Your friends envy your theater and on game day you invite them over and hold court like the king of TV land. In the second setup, you aren't "unhappy", but you see the new, super-think LED TVs at Costco and you sigh. Sure, your TV is okay, and your only other choice is to not watch the game at all (that would be the negative consequence).
Sure, maybe a nonsensical example, but the same concept could be applied to most any product. I am sure most of us wouldn't choose to use Microsoft Outlook for work, but we aren't given much of a choice if we want to keep our job. I use Google docs a lot because it does what I need it to do, and I don't have to pay for it. So, I get the double-whammy satisfaction of accomplishing a task using the tool and saving money over buying MS-Office.
So, we established why people use products (for some value of "established"), now, what if we were to go a little deeper and look at the root motivations that reside somewhere in the core of human psyche. Can we not say that people use products to either generate pleasure (emotional or physical) or to prevent pain (the "negative consequence")? If this theory holds true, couldn't we design products with those root motivations in mind?
What I am thinking is a concept of "Motivation-based Experience Design", which basically means an intelligent design which adapts to the current root motivation of the user. This could allow a system to support the goals it was designed to accomplish, but do so in such a manner as to make it enjoyable for the user.
In the software industry, people have been working on interface design for quite some time, and they have certainly improved. However, I think there is still something missing, and that something is adaptability, actually, motivation-driven adaptability. So, I use a Macbook Pro for most of my work, if you are unfamiliar with Apple products, it is a laptop with a 15" screen. Attached to this laptop, I also have an 24" external monitor, where I do the lion's share of my work. However, when I have an application open on the monitor, the menu bar is still over on the laptop screen, which is a hassle when I want to us it.
What if the operating system determined my focus and moved the menu bar to follow? Or, what if, when I opened two documents that were very similar, the application automatically put the windows side-by-side and highlighted the differences (maybe the second document could have been opened with a "open & compare" menu item). These are the kinds of things that take the daily tasks we have to do to avoid negative consequences and make them much more positive, therefore allowing us to get positive emotional benefit from completing the task. They could be done by establishing what my current motivation was ("Oh look, he is using a word processor on an external monitor...") and then adjusting the interface to adapt ("Hey, why don't I move the menu bar over there so he doesn't have to drag the pointer waaaaaay over there..."). Or, perhaps the system could change your startup applications based on time of day and network availability. Each of these things could make utilizing the operating system and applications much more agreeable, therefore tickling the pleasure centers of the brain instead of tripping up the emotional "pain" centers (like when you have to wait for all your applications to start, even though they don't have any network connectivity...).
I'm not trying to say that product design rooted in core motivations will change the world, what I am saying is that, as product designers, we should start really thinking about who we are designing for. It isn't us, because we aren't our customers. Also, to be honest, the people we think are our customers probably aren't our customers either. Know who you are building the product for, before you design it, and make your product so it adapts to their motivations. If you do that, and you manage to execute the product well, you will change your part of the world, that's for sure.
Just some food for thought.
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