A short story.

Persona

Scenario and storyboard

I performed this exercise with my house as the departure point. I’m very familiar with the streets in this neighborhood, but I haven’t been outside on foot awhile because it’s cold (it was 35 degrees when I did this exercise).

As such, the temperature was the biggest factor in my observations. There were no other people out, so everything I took note of were objects and seasonally related, like the kinds of pumpkins on porch steps, different ways of storing firewood, and how the leaves have fallen completely off of some trees but not others.

The most interesting part of my brisk walk was how I could hear a lawnmower, which seemed ridiculous to me, but I never saw it. That got me thinking of certain neighbors who were incredibly vigilant with keeping up with yard work all summer long, but seemed to be having a losing (or maybe even forfeited) battle with leaves. I don’t blame them.

Now, off for some hot chocolate…

Five forces:

I’ve chosen to use the campus where I work, and the mixed-use corridor between it’s location and the main downtown street in my town as the area of study.

Female-dominated areas: My domain includes part of a women’s college, and observed more women than men on those streets. A few blocks away, at the college where I work, I noticed certain study areas always have more women than men.

Educational: There are several churches, schools and studios in the area. I would be interested in seeing how educational activities represent a force in this area.

Events: With two colleges, the main downtown street, and an arts district within a few blocks from each other, there are certain areas that are very event heavy.

Kid-friendly: Parks, daycares and elementary schools? Age-specific events? What about the number of restaurants with kid menus or high chairs in this field? I see this as a layer on top of the events and educational.

Historic buildings: Which buildings are the oldest? Are any on historic registers?

Map of the St. Louis Zoo

Hierarchy of Needs

The map and legend only highlight specific points of interest to patrons due to the hierarchy of their needs. Things like viewing platforms and souvenir penny presses are not included, for example.

Picture Superiority Effect

Instead of writing the names of the animals on display in certain habitats, the maps employs a simple outline of the animal’s form instead.

Accessibility

By color coding the different levels of accessible paths, this map goes one step further by showing the user the levels of accessibility on various paths throughout the zoo.

Legibility

The main areas of the zoo are displayed with a black background so they have the highest contrast. These titles stand out and are easier to read than all other kinds of text on the map.

Mimicry/ Continuation

The use of hash marks to show train tracks on the map employs mimicry as a design strategy. The marks mimic the real-life look of actual train tracks. In this particular close-up, the train tracks are separated, but because of the Gestalt principle of continuation, it appears as if the train tracks are in a tunnel instead of ending and beginning again.

Flamingos and oddities.

Beloved object

I love the hammock I bought this summer. It symbolizes the joy of summer and backyards, two of my favorite things, and gives me a way to visibly share that with my family.

The affordances are straightforward. The softness of the swing invites tactile interaction and the size indicates full climbing-into-ness. The use of fabric creates physical constraints to inform the user of the actions you can take in a hammock. For example, the hung fabric is unsteady, so if you try to stand up, the unsafe wobbliness that would immediately emerge could be considered important feedback indicating how to use a hammock carefully.

Despised object

The corner kitchen cupboard*. It goes back very far and I feel like I have to wrestle with at least one blender, stand mixer,  slow cooker or heavy panini press every time I try to retrieve something, anything, from its sinister depths.

Storage is at a premium, so the cupboard must be confronted with frequently, but the physical constraints make the experience miserable.  While affordances are clear, the difficulty of using the space represents a breakdown of my kitchen habituation. 

*I acknowledge quibbling some may have with defining a cupboard as the “functional object” prescribed by the assignment, and I can go into my justifications if needed.

Based on the idea that humans are accustomed to how things when lit from overhead from the sun, this strategy refers to the design bias for showing objects and people as lit from above or even the top left. When ignored, the effect appears eerie or unnatural.

Definition Source: UPoD

Source: UPoD

Source

“Kiss Me Deadly” dir. Robert Aldrich, 1955. Subversion of top-down bias for dramatic effect in famous last scene.

Readability

Readability refers to easy to understand something is. This is in contrast to legibility, which is more to do with how easy to read letters and form words. There are couple known methods of determining how readable a text is with a score that evaluates the length of sentences, how many sentences, number of clauses, word length, and number of syllables, to name a few. Famous readability formulas are called the Flesch formula, the Dale Chall formula, and the Kincaid formula, which tells you which grade they estimate the reader needs to have attained to comfortably read the text.

Definition Source: UPoD

Source: UPod

Source: Microsoft Word readability score

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Source: Original photo, college campus bulletin board. Comparing the readability of two events: a nursing open house (made more readable with bullets) vs. a faculty lecture (low readability).

The ratio between a subject’s body to face in an image can change the perceived meaning of the image. That ratio is called face-ism, and is measured on a scale of low (an image without a face) to high (an image of only a face). When shown an image with high face-ism the user will focus on the subject’s intellect and personality more than a full-body or low-faceism image..

Source: UPoD

Source: UPoD

This is an example of what participants in a study drew when asked to draw a female and a male. The study found that men were typically drawn with detailed and larger faces, while the form of the woman was given more emphasis than her face as drawn by both men and women.

“Face-ism” by Dane Archer and Debra Kimes and Michael Barrios http://www.uic.edu.hk/~jkulrich/english/reading/faceism.pdf

Source: Original Photo, back to back spreads in a magazine

Accessibility

An accessible design is created to be used by the most users representing a variety of abilities. Accessibility is discussed in for categories, according to UPoD: operability, perceptibility, forgiveness and simplicity.

Operability refers to a design that is universal for all abilities. Perceptibility is when any user can perceive a design regardless of the level of sensory control. This is done through using multiple sensory responses, like haptic and audio. Forgiveness is a design that utilizes good constraints and clear affordances to reduce user error. Simplicity is to avoid the overcomplication so more people can use the design and easily understand it

Definition source: UPoD

Source: UPod

Source: W3

Source: Original photo, Braille on building sign.

Hunter-Nurture Fixations

This design principle references the biological behaviors of boys and girls to have interests that align with hunter and nurturer characteristics, respectively, during early childhood. This behavior does not appear to be solely a result of stereotypical gender role enforcement, as male and female Vervet monkeys also behaved in this way. UPoD describes hunter behaviors as “object motion and location, weapons and tools, hunting and fighting, predators and physical play.” Nurturer behaviors include “form and colors, facial expressions and interpersonal skills, nurturing and caretaking, babies, and verbal play.”

Definition source: UPoD

Source: UPoD

Source: Ninjago vs. Barbie, toys targeted to the same age group

Source: Original photo. “Kids, go grab some favorite toys.” The boy has a fake knife in his teeth, in case you’re wondering. As the second born, my daughter grew up in a house of balls, cars, trains, etc and turned the balls into family groups, had mommy cars lead baby cars, etc.

Constraint

This design strategy limits the actions that a user takes, either through physical constraint or psychological constraints. Physical constraints include paths (like a swipe or scroll), axes (a rotary dial or a trackball) and barriers (the computer screen edges or an electric plug). Constraints are helpful to minimize user’s mistakes and slips by making the error difficult or impossible to make in the first place.

Definition Sources: UPoD and NNG’s “Preventing User Errors: Avoiding Unconscious Slips” by Page Laubheimer (https://www.nngroup.com/articles/slips/)

Source: UPoD

Source: “Taking Donald Norman’s Design Principles to Web Design, Part 2” by Patrick McNeil (http://www.howdesign.com/web-design-resources-technology/donald-normans-design-principles-applied-modern-web-design-part-2/).

Source: Original photo (dishwasher liquid container as example of constraint to prevent user error)