Week Two

Chapter 3

Chapter 3 began to make it apparent how poorly designed many interfaces are. Even though many interfaces are poorly designed, I think it would be difficult to hold anyone really accountable for it - unless the design is just blatantly bad. I say this because interaction design is a relatively new field; just as cognitive science. In my opinion, this chapter shows that it's really not known what's exactly going on in the mind/brain. We have a pretty good understanding of what we think is going on, and plenty of great theories that are probably correct, but plenty of things aren't complete fact yet. Most importantly, we don't know why something is happening, or why some design looks better than another. Otherwise there wouldn’t be so many models and theories of cognition – many of which are mentioned in this chapter. So if the brain hasn’t been figured out yet, how can we expect someone who doesn't understand the mind/brain to design something that will appeal to it?

It’s interesting that the most important part of cognition in regards to interaction design is memory. While memory is important, it seems to me that attention, perception, learnability, and many other factors are just as important. Although, I suppose it does depend on how information is presented. The phone example in the chapter does make a strong argument for memory being very important, however the Google and Apple’s Spotlight search tool make a strong argument that attention and perception are important. The difference between the phone and Google is that one is spoken and the other is graphical. I think I would argue that all aspects of cognition are equally important in regards to interaction design, although it largely depends on the situation in which the information was presented.

The wide array of theories of cognition are also interesting, considering they range from the theory of action to distributed cognition. ie: Things happen sequentially in the brain, or things happen across a larger cognitive unit.

Chapter 4

Chapter 4 discusses communication and collaboration, and outlines just how important it is to society. It seems that distributed cognition should have also been integrated into this chapter, as it can be applied as a theory to most of the topics covered.

After reading the chapter I think there is a long way to go with electronic and technological mediums in communication. Things like electronic whiteboards, videophones, and BiReality may all be impressive communication and collaboration ideas, the authors make them out to be inadequate. However, that being said, the authors also discuss how face-to-face and telephone communication can be just as difficult.

What really intrigues me is how much people communicate indirectly; without even really knowing they are. The book provides examples, such as leaving an office door open to indicate you can be approached, or how a person might stare at their watch to indicate they need to leave a conversation. It would be interesting to give people some sort of feedback mechanism, that would show them all of their own mannerisms. Then to see how the people would react, and possibly even change how they act and respond to similar situations.

Communication breakdown and its repair mechanisms are also interesting. I think the most interesting part is what causes them. Why is it that some information may not be recalled, even though it's clear that someone knows what they're talking about? Or why is it easier to recognize something, and put a name to it, than try to recall something outright? It's fascinating how someone can quickly repair a hiccup in the conversation, without it causing any sort of disruption. Generally the problem is remedied quickly, and the conversation just continues as if nothing had happened.

In summation, people are always going to need to communicate and collaborate on many different things. The farther technology comes, and the more interaction design helps it, the easier it's going to be on people to do these things. Since communication and collaboration are inherent human traits, the more help they can get while performing them, the better they're going to be.