Chapter One: Introduction

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 What is HCI?
• Stands for Human Computer Interaction
• Study the physical characteristics of machines and systems and how
these affect users performance.
• How to enhance the user performance in the context of any system
(i.e. computer)
• It deals with the theory , design , implementation , and evaluation
of the ways that humans use and interact with computing devices.

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 Cont…
What is difference between interface and interaction ?
• Interaction refers to an abstract model by which humans
interact with the computing device for a given task,
– Examples: Clicking a button to submit a form (action) and
receiving a confirmation message (feedback).
• Key Characteristics:
Abstract and conceptual.
It involves how users perform tasks, provide input, and
receive feedback from the system.
Independent of the specific technology used to
implement it.
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 Cont…
• Interface is a choice of technical realization (hardware or
software) of such a given interaction model.
– Example: A graphical user interface (GUI) with
buttons, menus, and icons.
– A touchscreen interface on a smartphone.
• Key Characteristics:
Concrete and tangible.
Focuses on the technology and design used to enable
interaction.
Dependent on the specific hardware or software
implementation.
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Cont…
Example: Using a mobile banking app.
 Interface: The app's screen layout, including buttons
like "Transfer Money," "Check Balance," and the color
scheme.
 Interaction: The process of tapping "Transfer
Money," entering the amount, selecting a recipient, and
receiving a confirmation message.
Generally
 The interface is the "what"—the visual or physical
elements users interact with.
 The interaction is the "how"—the process and
experience of using those elements to achieve a goal. 5
 Cont…
A communication between user and machine can be
 Direct Interaction:- The user provides input, and
the machine responds immediately with feedback or
output.
Example: Playing a Video Game:
User Action: Pressing a button on a controller to make a
character jump.
Machine Response: The character jumps instantly on the
screen.
Feedback: Visual and auditory (e.g., sound effects).

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 Cont…
 Indirect Interaction:- The user provides input,
but the machine processes it without immediate
feedback or control from the user.
• Sending an Email:
User Action: Composing an email and clicking "Send."
Machine Response: The email is sent to the recipient's
server.
Feedback: The user sees a "Sent" confirmation, but the
actual delivery and reading of the email by the recipient
happen later without the sender's direct control.

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 Cont…
• HCI has become much more important in recent years as
computers (and embedded devices) have become
commonplace in almost all facets of our lives
• Focus of HCI has been in how to design interaction and
implement interfaces for high usability
• The term high usability means that the resulting interfaces
are
easy to use,
efficient for the task,
ensure safety, and
lead to a correct completion of the task

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 Cont…
• Computer revolution, making the operation of a
computer intuitive and much easier than the previous
system of keyboard commands.
• The Internet phenomenon could not have happened
without the web-browser interface.
• Smartphones, with their touch-oriented interfaces, have
nearly replaced the previous generation of feature
phones.

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 Who is involved in HCI ?
• HCI is a multi-disciplinary subject
 Phycology and cognitive science ; to get users
perceptual , cognitive and problem solving skill
 Focus on How people think, learn, and solve problems.
 Example: Designing a mobile app with big buttons and simple
menus so users can easily find what they need.
Ergonomics – Understanding the physical
capabilities and limitations of users.
Focus on How people physically interact with devices.
Example: Making a computer mouse that fits comfortably in
your hand and doesn’t cause strain.
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 Cont…
 Sociology – to understand the wider context of interaction
Focus on how people use technology in groups or societies.
Example: Designing a social media app that lets families
share photos and messages easily.
 Computer science and Engineering – to build necessary
technology
Focus on Building the technology itself.
Example: Writing the code for a fitness tracker to count
steps and display them on a screen.
 Business – to market it
Focus on Making sure the product sells and meets user
needs.
Example: Researching what features people want in a
smartwatch before designing it.
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 Cont…
 Graphic design – to produce an effective interface
presentation
Focus on Making the interface look good and easy to
understand.
Example: Choosing colors, fonts, and layouts for a weather
app so it’s visually appealing
 Technical writing – to produce the manuals and so on
Focus on writing clear instructions for users.
Example: Creating a user manual for a new video game
console.
• It is impossible to design an effective interactive system from
one discipline in isolation
– Input is needed from all side
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Theory and HCI
• There is no general and unified theory of HCI
• However , there is an underlying principle “people use
machine to accomplish task”
• Three major issues of concern
The people
The machine
The tasks that are performed

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Cont…
• There are three “use” words that must be true for a
product to be successful; it must be :-
Useful :- accomplish what is required : play music ,
format a document
Usable :- do it easily and naturally , without danger
of error etc
Used :- make people want to use it , be attractive ,
engaging , fun etc

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Chapter two
The human

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 Introduction
• Human is one of the foundation of HCI , a central
character of any interactive system
• The requirement of the user should be our first priority
• In order to design an interactive system , first understand the
capability and limitation of users

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 Input-output channel
• A person’s interaction with the outside world occurs
through information being received and sent:
• In an interaction with a computer the user receives
information that is output by the computer, and responds
by providing input to the computer
• the user’s output becomes the computer’s input and vice versa.

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 Cont…
• Input in the human occurs mainly through the senses and
output through the motor control of the effectors
• There are five major senses: sight, hearing, touch, taste and
smell.
• Of these, the first three are the most important to HCI.
• Taste and smell do not currently play a significant role in
HCI.
• Similarly there are a number of effectors, including the
limbs, fingers, eyes, head and vocal system.
• In this section we will look at the main elements of such an
interaction
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 Vision
• Complex activity
• Two stages in vision
Physical reception of stimulus: This involves the eye
capturing light and converting it into neural signals.
Processing and interpretation of stimulus: The
brain processes these signals to form a coherent visual
perception.
• Identify what can and can not be perceived visually by a
human , affects the way that design a computer system.

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 The Eye - physical reception
• Vision begins with light
• Mechanism for receiving light and transforming it into electrical
energy
– light reflects from objects
– The cornea and lens at the front of the eye focus the light into a
sharp image on the back of the eye, the retina.
– Because of how light bends when it passes through the cornea
and lens, the image on your retina is upside-down.
– The retina is light sensitive and contains two types of photoreceptor:
– Rods help you see in dim light (like at night).
– Cones help you see colors and details (like the color of a
flower).
– The rods and cones in your retina turn the light into electrical
signals.
– ganglion cells (brain!) detect pattern and movement 20
Interpreting the signal
• Size and depth
visual angle indicates how much of view object
occupies (image size) = affects our image perception
relates to size and distance from eye
– visual acuity is ability to perceive detail
– Visual acuity decreases as objects move farther away or
when lighting conditions are poor.

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Object A:
•Size: 10 cm
•Distance: 1 meter (100 cm)
Object B:
•Size: 20 cm
•Distance: 2 meters (200 cm)

 Even though Object B is twice as large as Object A, it is also

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 Hearing
 Sound can convey a remarkable amount of information
 It is rarely used to its potential in interface design, usually
being confined to warning sounds and notifications
 The exception is multimedia, which may include music,
voice commentary and sound effects.
 However, the ear can differentiate quite subtle sound
changes and recognize familiar sounds without
concentrating attention on the sound source.
 This suggests that sound could be used more extensively in
interface design, to convey information about the system
state.
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 Touch
 We receive stimuli through the skin.
 The skin contains three types of sensory receptor:
 Thermoreceptors respond to heat and cold
 Example: Feeling the warmth of the sun or the coldness of ice.
 Nociceptors respond to pain caused by intense pressure, heat,
or damage to tissues
 Example: Feeling pain when you touch something too hot or get a cut.
 Mechanoreceptors respond to pressure, touch, and vibration.
 Example: Feeling the pressure of a handshake or the vibration of a
phone.

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 Memory
• Three types of memory or memory function: sensory
buffers, short-term memory or working memory, and
long-term memory.

Figure 1.9 A model of the structure of memory

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Sensory memory
• In order for anything to enter our memory it must
be picked by our senses(taste, touch, sight, hearing
and smell)
• Sensory memory make uses of these five senses in
order to be developed
• Buffers for stimuli received through senses
– iconic memory: visual stimuli
– echoic memory: aural stimuli
– haptic memory: touch stimuli
• Continuously overwritten by new information
coming in on these channels.
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Short Term Memory
Also called working memory
Is everything you are thinking of at the current
moment
• Information is passed from sensory memory
into short-term memory by attention, thereby
filtering the stimuli to only those which are of
interest at a given time.
• Attention is the concentration of the mind on
one out of a number of competing stimuli or
thoughts.
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Short Term Memory (cont)
• It is clear that we are able to focus our attention
selectively, choosing to attend to one thing rather than
another.
• This is due to the limited capacity of our sensory and
mental processes.
• If we did not selectively attend to the stimuli coming
into our senses, we would be overloaded.

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Long-term memory (LTM)
• We store factual information, experiential knowledge
and procedural rules of behaviour
• In fact everything that we know
• Repository for all our knowledge (main resource)
– slow access ~ 1/10 (0.1)second
– slow decay, if any
– huge or unlimited capacity
• Two types
– episodic – serial memory of events
– semantic – structured memory of facts, concepts, skills

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 Thinking

Reasoning
deduction, induction, abduction
Problem solving

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 Deductive Reasoning
• is a top-down approach where you start with a
general statement or hypothesis and examine the
possibilities to reach a specific, logical conclusion.
• If the original premises are true and the logic is
valid, the conclusion reached is necessarily true.
• General to specific.
Example:
All humans are mortal. (General statement)
Socrates is a human. (Specific statement)
Therefore, Socrates is mortal. (Conclusion)
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 Inductive Reasoning
• is a bottom-up approach where you start with specific
observations or facts and use them to develop a general
conclusion or theory.
• The conclusion reached is probable, but not certain,
even if the premises are true.
• Specific to general.
Example:
Observation: In a study of 100 university students, 85
reported feeling stressed during exam week. (Specific
observation)
Observation: These students also reported poor sleep and
increased caffeine consumption during the same period.
(More specific observations)
Conclusion: Therefore, exam week likely causes stress, poor
sleep, and increased caffeine consumption among university
students. (General conclusion) 33
 Abductive reasoning
 is a form of logical inference that starts with an observation
or set of observations and seeks to find the simplest and
most likely explanation for those
• It starts with an observation (e.g., symptoms)
• It considers multiple possible explanations.
• It selects the most plausible explanation based on the
available evidence, even though it’s not certain.
Example of Abductive Reasoning:
 Observation: You come home and find your front door open.
 Possible Explanations:
 A family member came home and forgot to close the door.
 A burglar broke into your house.
 The wind blew the door open.
 Most Likely Explanation: You remember that your sibling was
supposed to come home earlier, so you conclude that they
probably left the door open. (Best guess) 34
 Problem Solving
• Finding answers to hard tasks using what you know.
• Two Ways to Solve Problems:
Gestalt Theory: Sometimes you just "get it" (insight) or
use past experiences.
Example: Suddenly figuring out a math problem after thinking
about it differently.
Problem Space Theory: Break the problem into steps
and solve it piece by piece.
Example: Solving a puzzle by trying one move at a time.

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Mistakes and How We Think
Two Types of Mistakes:
Slips: You know what to do but mess up (e.g., typing
"adn" instead of "and").
Mistakes: You do the wrong thing because you don’t
understand (e.g., clicking the wrong button).
• Mental Models: How you think something works.
Example: If you think a "save" button saves to the cloud
but it saves to your computer, you might lose your file.
 Make systems match how people think to avoid
mistakes.
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 Emotions
• Feelings like happiness, frustration, or stress.
• How Emotions Affect You:
Happy/Relaxed: You solve problems better and enjoy
using the system.
Example: A fun game application makes you feel good and
keeps you playing.
Stressed/Frustrated: Problems feel harder, and you
might give up.
Example: A confusing website makes you annoyed, and you
leave.
• Make interfaces fun, easy, and stress-free to
keep users happy.
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 Individual difference
• People are Different in Many Ways:
Long-Term differences: Age, abilities, or gender (e.g.,
older people might need bigger text).
Short-Term differences: Stress or tiredness (e.g., a
tired student might struggle with a hard application).
Changing difference : People change over time (e.g.,
kids learn faster than adults).
• Design for everyone by making systems
flexible and easy to use.

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