COLLEGE OF COMPUTER STUDIES

INTERACTION DESIGN BASICS

"Design isn't finished until somebody is using it."

~ Brenda Laurel, Ph.D

Learning Outcomes

At the end of the chapter, students will be able to:

1. Understand the meaning, significance, and use of interaction design;
2. Maximize their understanding of interaction design; and
3. Apply their learnings of interaction design in creating an efficient and user-friendly
interface.

INTRODUCTION

Is interaction design something familiar to you? Whether you have heard of it or not, you
most definitely have already used this at least once in your life especially if you have any kind of
technology around you. Interaction design has its origins in graphic designing and web but now
it has gotten so big that it has everything to do with what you see on your smartphones,
computers, gaming consoles, and other gadgets, devices, or appliances all around you.

This chapter tackles what you need to know about interaction design basics which will
help you understand its purpose in human-computer interaction so that you may know how to
apply it.

What is interaction design (IxD)?

Interaction design or IxD is the interaction between a user and a product which often
involves elements like aesthetics, sound, motion, and many more. This is the practice of
designing interactive digital products, environments, systems, and services. In other words,
interaction design is simply the design interaction between products and users. According to the
Interaction Design Association (IxDA), interaction design or IxD is what defines the behavior
and structure of interactive systems to create a connection between a user and technology. In
other words, it is the one responsible in allowing you to interact or connect to your device
through clicking, swiping, tapping, or typing.

The IxD is a goal-directed, problem solving activity informed by target domain, materials,
cost, feasibility, and its intended use. It is a creative activity and a decision-making activity to
balance trade-offs. IxD is also a representation of a plan for development and a set of
alternatives and successive elaborations.

Interaction design history

The term The "Interaction Design" was first coined by Bill Verplank and Bill Moggridge
in the mid-1980s. For Bill Verplank, this term was an adaptation of the computer science term
"user interface design" for the industrial design profession. On the other hand, for Bill
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Moggridge, this term was an improvement of the soft-face (in which he had coined in 1984 as a
referral to the application of industrial design to software-containing products).

Muriel Cooper first developed one of the earliest programs in design for Interactive
interactive technologies called the Visible Language Workshop back in 1975. The next
program to be developed after the Visible Language Workshop was called
Telecommunications Program created by Martin Elton back in 1979 at the the NYU which
was later head by Red Burns. After a few years, the first academic program for IxD was
established at the Carnegie Mellon University in 1994 officially called as the "Interaction
Design".

By 2001, an institute for IxD was founded by Crampton Smith in Northern Italy
dedicated entirely for interaction design. This institute was called the Interaction Design
Institute Ivrea. This institute was then merged with Domus Academy and was moved to Milan
in 2005. Then in 2007, the Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design was set up. After
Ivrea, Crampton Smith alongside Philip Tabor added the IxD in the Visual and Multimedia
Communication as a track in the University of Venice, Italy around 2006 up to 2014.

Methodologies of IxD

1. Goal-Oriented Design

This methodology is also called the Goal-Directed Design. The goal-directed

design was developed by Alan Cooper as a user-centered method to address situation
wherein different users of a proposed product express their desire for some aspects of
the product. This methodology describes a six-step process in talking to users, analyzing
what they want, and decision-making whether users will be satisfied with the same
interfaces or not. This method includes the following steps:

a) Research – interviewing users and stakeholders, reviewing the domain,

benchmarking and literature review.

b) Modelling – results from the interview are reviewed for common patterns to
create models. These models include:

i. Personas (archetypical user models) - these are not based on one user.
However, these embody a specific behavior pattern and goal that is seen
during interviews of end-users.
ii. Workflows - this embodies what individuals do, in what order do they do
it, and how does an individual relate to another through their workflows.

c) Requirements Definition - defines the requirements for each persona, the data
they need to see, and the functional needs they have for working with this data.

d) Framework Definition - sketching of the layout before the input of other details,
planning of how the interface will look like.

e) Design - a detailed form and behavior specifications for the interface-based

principles, patterns, and practices.
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f) Development - where the coding begins based on the given specifications.

2. Personas

These personas are archetypes that describe the various goals and the observed
behavior patterns among the users. A persona must be able to encapsulate critical
behavioral data in such a way that the stakeholders and designers are able to
understand, remember, and relate to. This method uses a storytelling way to engage the
social aspects and emotional aspects of users that help the designers to visualize the
best behavior of the product and understand why this recommended design is
successful.

3. Usability

This method determines if the interface is usable by the user and if the ease-of
use is present. Usability is the outcome of a user-centered design process which
examines why and how a user will adopt a product and seeks to evaluate that use.
According to Jacob Nielsen, usability is described as the quality attribute to determine
how usable an interface is.

There are five characteristics of usable products:

i. Effectiveness - whether users can complete their goals with a high degree of
accuracy that comes from the support provided to users when the users work
with the product.
ii. Efficiency - the speed of the product being used by the user.
iii. Engagingness - this refers to the level of engagement a system offers to a user
by making it look user-friendly.
iv. Error Tolerance - minimizing occurrences of errors to ensure a quick recovery
from an error and allow the user to finish whatever the user is doing with the
system.
v. Ease of Learning - giving the users a platform that is easy to use and easy to
learn.

4. Affective Interaction Design

The affective interaction design is a method that helps convey aspects like the
emotional responses of users, creative influences, and motivational and learning
influences. An example of this method is by using animations and sound for better
communication and interaction between the product and the user. This method
increases perceptions of the usability of the product.

5. Cognitive Dimension

Cognitive dimensions are what provide vocabularies to further evaluate and

modify design solutions. This offers a lightweight approach in analyzing the quality of a
design rather than giving a detailed description. This method provides high level
descriptions of the interface and the interaction of the user which includes consistency
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and viscosity. It aids the creation of new designs using a design maneuver that changes
the design of a particular dimension.

INTERACTION DESIGN ASSOCIATION

The Interaction Design Association or the IxDA was incorporated in 2005. It was
incorporated to address the needs of the then-emergent field of interaction design which has
grown to be an industry and an area of study that has also received great recognition for its
value in creating great products.

The IxDA was the first community built for people who were interested in practicing
interaction design and now this association is one of the largest globally – gathering over 200
local groups and 100,000 individuals. This community connects professional craft and shared
human condition to become more advanced in designing. They are composed of designers,
developers, researchers, academics, and so much more which is extended to employers,
sponsors, and other product creators.

Importance of Interaction Design

In human-computer interaction, interaction design is widely used. It plays a very

important role in allowing a user, customer, or anyone to interact with technology itself in a way
that is understandable and easy for them to use. IxD has a significant role when it comes to
allow the consumers use the various touch points to interact and engage with technology. IxD
allows you to control these interactions for you to get your desired outcome. Like controlling
what the customers or users will see, how they will use it, and what they can do it. This will
definitely increase your capability to limit and control how the people will react and interact with
your product.

Tips in creating your own interaction design

1. Focus On User Needs

It is very important as an interaction designer to be user centric. You must be

able to use the same language they commonly use and organize the user's information
(as well as functions) that enables the user to familiarize and perform the tasks of the
product easily.

This will also require you to have a good understanding of who your target
market, client, customer is, what challenges do they face on a daily basis, and what do
they need to learn. Having a good understanding about the needs of the user will help
you find a better way to respond to it.

2. Accommodate the User's Working Memory

It is usually said that people in general can only hold an average of 4 to 5 pieces of
information at a certain time in their working memory. This must be kept in mind for you to
refrain from creating clutter in your design. There must be a simultaneousness and limit
 COLLEGE OF COMPUTER STUDIES

according to the number of instructions or elements that the user will remember as they
use your product with your design.

3. Users Must Be Given Hints

The user may not always know the right text or elements to click on once they
begin or carry on with the interaction process. You must ensure that with your design, the
clickable elements are highlighted which will help the users understand the consequences
of their actions.

CASE STUDIES RELATED TO INTERACTION DESIGN

Establishing Requirements for a Mobile Learning System

In a case study by a European-funded research and development project, MobiLearn

was created. It started from exploring new ways of using mobile environments in meeting the
needs of the learners who work by themselves and with others. The Europeans who conducted
this project to develop a new m-learning architecture to support the creation, delivery,
brokerage, and tracking of the learning and information content. The project used ambient
intelligence, location dependence, personalization, multimedia, instant messaging, and
distributed databases. This involved many notations and methods in establishing the
requirements of this project.

The MobiLearn revolved around the application of mobile technologies in three strands:
museum strand, Business strand, and health strand. Each strand was studied to understand
how mobile technology can be used in that strand. Interaction design was used in this project as
a way for the users of each strand to interact and use the mobile technology being proposed
that fit the user requirements and the strand environment.

Communicability Evaluation

This case study focuses on the use of communicability evaluation to analyze the user's
experience wherein there are two instances of the same type of application which are the HTML
tag editors. Communicability is defined as the distinctive quality of an interactive computer-
based system that communicates efficiently and effectively. It is the use of an underlying design
intent and interactive principles. The purpose of this study was to show how the results of a
particular evaluation method can explain, identify, and inform the redesign of a problematic
interaction design.

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