Donald A. Norman's Blog, page 10

The righteous mind: why good people are divided by politics and religion

An engrossing, important book.


This is really three books. For me, the first is the most important, for it spells out clearly and distinctly the arguments that many of us cognitive scientists have been making in the past few years: emotions first, reasoning second. More and more, we are learning that people make rapid, subconscious decisions, driven by past experience, driven by quick (and often shallow) surface features and analyses, and by emotions. Then, afterwards, their reflective systems chime in, offering reasons and logic long after the decision has been made. We reason, goes the new approach in order to justify our decisions to ourselves - that is, to our conscious selves. Our subconscious needs no rationalization. The second book lays out six basic dimensions of morality, common to all peoples, says Haidt. Differences arise because different people, cultures, and societies weight the dimensions very differently. Book three applies these analyses to the domain of religion and politics.

The intention economy: when customers take charge

The world of business is company-centered. Powerful Information technologies exist to help companies, CRM being one of the most powerful and popular - CRM for Customer Relationship Management. What if all of this was reversed? What if the customers had all the tools? What if every one of us had our own Vendor Relationship Management system, a VRM? What if we owned our own data and collected and mined data about the vendors? What if we could share information about the trustworthiness and reliability of vendors? What if people had the power and companies served us? In this book, Doc Searls shows how we can completely reverse the traditional relationship between people and companies. Read the book. It will change the way you view business. Even if you represent one of the businesses discussed in the book, you will find much to learn, much to enjoy, and new ideas to pursue.

Life at home in the twenty-first century

An enticing ethnographic study of life in a small sample of families in Los Angeles, California. Ethnography offers the advantage of detailed, in-depth examination of everyday life. This book provides a rich analysis of 32 families in Los Angeles, California. When studied, it yields huge insights into how people arrange their households, organize them, and how they struggle to fit all their numerous activities into their lives. The text and numerous detailed photographs are engrossing.

Discussion with John Maeda of RISD: What Is Design

John Maeda, now president of the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) had a public, semi-moderated discussion with me at a PARC Forum. The video is now available. I wanted to talk about complex design: interaction design, design planning, etc. He wanted to talk about the beauty of fonts, of knives, and even of the office chair. I tried to say these were simple products that barely needed any understanding of human behavior and cognition -- I want to design the complex. He didn't understand my point. In fact, when I specifically asked him how to design a networking connection scheme that would work for everyday people his answer was a long ramble that never even started to address the issue. So we failed to connect. But many seemed to find the discussion of interest. Decide for yourself.

What Moves? Culture & Interaction Design

When What Is Natural For Some Is Not for Others: Culture and Design. I was in Asia, giving a talk. I was given a remote controller for advancing my slides. This one had with two buttons, one above the other. When I pushed the upper button to advance to the slide, I was flustered: I went backwards through my slide set, not forward. "How could this happen?" I wondered. To me, top obviously means forward, bottom backwards. I decided to ask the audience what they thought: To my great surprise, the audience was split in their responses. Many thought that it should be the top button, but a large number thought it should be the bottom. But there is more. This is a point of view question, one that has plagued designers for years (which moves? The text or the window?) Different cultures have very different points of view. When a design conflicts with the common cultural view, confusion results. (Article posted at core77.com and jnd.org. bit.ly/NZckqz )

How To Find a Job or Graduate School in Human-Computer Interaction, Interaction, or Industrial Design

I'm frequently asked how to find a job or a place to study, either in industrial design or user-interface design (Human-Computer Interaction). Rather than answer it anew each time, let me summarize my answer here.

You either need real work experience or a graduate degree, or both. I cannot tell you what to do. Good advice has to come from someone who knows you, who knows your interests, training, and skills. I cannot acquire that in an email message or two. So, seek out knowledgeable mentors where you live. Seek professors that you trust. Go to meetings of societies (see below). Read magazines and journals to learn who is doing what, where: then write to those people about their work.

Book Review: Living with Complexity

Gerd Waloszek of SAP User Experience has written a very nice, intelligent review of Living with Complexity. He neatly summarizes the major theme thusly:

"Norman's book is entitled Living with Complexity for good reason: The author does not advocate substituting complexity with simplicity. (As we will see below, this would not also make sense to Norman, because he does regard simplicity and complexity as opposites of each other: The first is, according to him, a state of the mind, whereas the other is a state of the world.) Much like Shedroff, Norman points out that complexity is an essential ingredient of the world and, thus of our lives. Norman writes that technology reflects this complexity, which by itself is neither good nor bad: it is confusion that is bad: We will see order and reason in complexity (and in complex technology) when we understand the underlying principles. When complexity is random and arbitrary, we are confused and have reason to be annoyed."

Read the full review. It is long and thoughtful.

Automobile Reviewers: Stuck in the Past

Like many of you, I live in the 21st century, a time when society is recognizing the damage done to the environment through our inattention to the side effects of our technologies. But one specialized niche of the world still lives in the 20th century: those who write the automobile reviews for magazines and newspapers. Why do automobile reviewers still emphasize appearance (styling), speed, and performance at high speed, often to the exclusion of all else? It is time for a change. Let's have reviewers who do not dwell on the latest exterior design details, horsepower, or acceleration. Let's have reviews addressed to real people and families, reviews that emphasize the environment and the health and safety of both drivers and passengers. Time to enter the 21st Century.

The Future of Automobiles (An Interview)

I was interviewed by Neil Briscoe for an article in IrishTimes.com: Is the love affair about to end? "Are cars as we know them to become a thing of the past?" asks the article. Where is the room for "Driving passion"? The question, Briscoe points out, is whether we can continue to have single people driving around, each in a ton and a half of metal.

Video: Don Norman speaks out about engineering design education

This is a short, 3 minute video, that captures the dilemma of modern education. Engineering education has become narrower and deeper. We teach and train specialties and specialists. Practical applications require tying together the knowledge of the many specialties. They require generalists, people who have broad, integrated understanding of the world. We need an educational system that rewards those who are broad and knowledgable as well as those who are deep and narrow, even if the broad knowledge comes at the expense of shallow depth. Being narrow is just as big a liability as being shallow. We need both kinds of people. Alas, the university hires, teaches, and trains only the deep and narrow.