Assignment #4 - Emotional Design vs. The Design of Everyday Things

Summery

In chapter one "Attractive Things Work Better" of Emotional Design, Don Norman quickly points out that multiple studies have been completed that show people interact better with devices that are considered attractive than their ugly counterpart. While these findings originally confused the researchers involved with the trials, Norman explains that this is the result of ingrained traits from the evolution of our species. He breaks the human brain(and its ability to process data) into three distinct levels:

Visceral - The most primitive form of reasoning that is present in all species.
Behavioral - Ability to analyze situation to optimize result.
Reflective - Unique to humans. Conscious thought with the ability to self analyse and learn.

Norman continues by explaining that different situations evoke reactions in different levels of the brain, and designers must be aware of this to aid in their design development. Specifically, they must balance increasing creativity while maintaining the correct level of focus. People respond to positive feelings with an increase in creativity and negative feelings with increased focus.

"Attractive things work better" vs  The Design of Everyday Things

"Attractive things work better" dives much deeper into human psychology than the book The Design of Everyday Things does. It is much more a study of how feelings impact design development. The two books  cover different ends of the spectrum however. All throughout The Design of Everyday Things the most important aspect of product design is that it is intuitive in its use. The user should be able to interact freely with the devices with little or no training and should not continually encounter the same error.  If possible all interactions such as button pressing should be mapped one to one with responses, and the response should be unique and clear.

The most distinct difference between the two books can be found in the statement, "Afterward, the tense and  anxious people will complain about the difficulties whereas the relaxed, happy ones will probably not even remember them." "Attractive things work better" aims to improve usability by increasing the overall mood of the user. If they are in a relativity good mood to begin with little problems with the product are likely to be overlooked or attributed to user error. This statement, however, clashes with the ideology found in The Design of Everyday Things. According to it, simple design errors should be identified early and removed if possible to improve the happiness of the user. The book even offers the example of the column free glass doors to demonstrate this.

I do not believe the two principles need be mutually exclusive. To get the best possible product design it would seem that the methods from The Design of Everyday Things should be applied first, then any improvements form Emotional Design  could be applied. (Assuming that don't violate the previous ideals)