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Cognitive engineering is a method of study using cognitive psychology and cognitive neuroscience to design and develop engineering systems to support or improve the cognitive processes of users. [1]
It was an engineering method used in the 1970s at Bell Labs, focused on how people form a cognitive model of a system based upon common metaphors. [2] As explained, by Joseph Henry Condon: [2]
"The idea is that people form a model. You present them with some instruments, tools, like a faucet, electric stove or something like that and demonstrate how it works. They then form in their heads a model that shows how it works inside to help them remember how to use it in the future. It may be a totally erroneous model of what is going on inside the black box."
— Joseph Henry Condon, "Interview with Joseph H. Condon (transcript)". History of Science, Princeton University. Retrieved 2017-05-17.
According to Condon, the ideas of cognitive engineering were developed later than, and independent from, the early work on the Unix operating system. [3]
Don Norman cited principles of cognitive engineering in his 1981 article, "The truth about Unix: The user interface is horrid." Norman criticized the user interface of Unix as being "a disaster for the casual user." [4] However the "casual user" is not the target audience for UNIX and as the Condon quote above indicates, a high level of user interface abstraction leads to cognitive models that may be "totally erroneous."
A graphical user interface, or GUI, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicators such as primary notation. In many applications, GUIs are used instead of text-based UIs, which are based on typed command labels or text navigation. GUIs were introduced in reaction to the perceived steep learning curve of command-line interfaces (CLIs), which require commands to be typed on a computer keyboard.
Donald Arthur Norman is an American researcher, professor, and author. Norman is the director of The Design Lab at University of California, San Diego. He is best known for his books on design, especially The Design of Everyday Things. He is widely regarded for his expertise in the fields of design, usability engineering, and cognitive science, and has shaped the development of the field of cognitive systems engineering. He is a co-founder of the Nielsen Norman Group, along with Jakob Nielsen. He is also an IDEO fellow and a member of the Board of Trustees of IIT Institute of Design in Chicago. He also holds the title of Professor Emeritus of Cognitive Science at the University of California, San Diego. Norman is an active Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), where he spends two months a year teaching.
The Unix philosophy, originated by Ken Thompson, is a set of cultural norms and philosophical approaches to minimalist, modular software development. It is based on the experience of leading developers of the Unix operating system. Early Unix developers were important in bringing the concepts of modularity and reusability into software engineering practice, spawning a "software tools" movement. Over time, the leading developers of Unix established a set of cultural norms for developing software; these norms became as important and influential as the technology of Unix itself, and have been termed the "Unix philosophy."
Rapid application development (RAD), also called rapid application building (RAB), is both a general term for adaptive software development approaches, and the name for James Martin's method of rapid development. In general, RAD approaches to software development put less emphasis on planning and more emphasis on an adaptive process. Prototypes are often used in addition to or sometimes even instead of design specifications.
Usability can be described as the capacity of a system to provide a condition for its users to perform the tasks safely, effectively, and efficiently while enjoying the experience. In software engineering, usability is the degree to which a software can be used by specified consumers to achieve quantified objectives with effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction in a quantified context of use.
Interaction design, often abbreviated as IxD, is "the practice of designing interactive digital products, environments, systems, and services." While interaction design has an interest in form, its main area of focus rests on behavior. Rather than analyzing how things are, interaction design synthesizes and imagines things as they could be. This element of interaction design is what characterizes IxD as a design field, as opposed to a science or engineering field.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to human–computer interaction:
The cognitive walkthrough method is a usability inspection method used to identify usability issues in interactive systems, focusing on how easy it is for new users to accomplish tasks with the system. A cognitive walkthrough is task-specific, whereas heuristic evaluation takes a holistic view to catch problems not caught by this and other usability inspection methods. The method is rooted in the notion that users typically prefer to learn a system by using it to accomplish tasks, rather than, for example, studying a manual. The method is prized for its ability to generate results quickly with low cost, especially when compared to usability testing, as well as the ability to apply the method early in the design phases before coding even begins.
GOMS is a specialized human information processor model for human-computer interaction observation that describes a user's cognitive structure on four components. In the book The Psychology of Human Computer Interaction. written in 1983 by Stuart K. Card, Thomas P. Moran and Allen Newell, the authors introduce: "a set of Goals, a set of Operators, a set of Methods for achieving the goals, and a set of Selections rules for choosing among competing methods for goals." GOMS is a widely used method by usability specialists for computer system designers because it produces quantitative and qualitative predictions of how people will use a proposed system.
User interface (UI) design or user interface engineering is the design of user interfaces for machines and software, such as computers, home appliances, mobile devices, and other electronic devices, with the focus on maximizing usability and the user experience. In computer or software design, user interface (UI) design primarily focuses on information architecture. It is the process of building interfaces that clearly communicate to the user what's important. UI design refers to graphical user interfaces and other forms of interface design. The goal of user interface design is to make the user's interaction as simple and efficient as possible, in terms of accomplishing user goals.
Cognitive ergonomics is a scientific discipline that studies, evaluates, and designs tasks, jobs, products, environments and systems and how they interact with humans and their cognitive abilities. It is defined by the International Ergonomics Association as "concerned with mental processes, such as perception, memory, reasoning, and motor response, as they affect interactions among humans and other elements of a system. Cognitive ergonomics is responsible for how work is done in the mind, meaning, the quality of work is dependent on the persons understanding of situations. Situations could include the goals, means, and constraints of work. The relevant topics include mental workload, decision-making, skilled performance, human-computer interaction, human reliability, work stress and training as these may relate to human-system design." Cognitive ergonomics studies cognition in work and operational settings, in order to optimize human well-being and system performance. It is a subset of the larger field of human factors and ergonomics.
Affective design describes the design of user interfaces in which emotional information is communicated to the computer from the user in a natural and comfortable way. The computer processes the emotional information and adapts or responds to try to improve the interaction in some way. The notion of affective design emerged from the field of human–computer interaction (HCI), specifically from the developing area of affective computing. Affective design serves an important role in user experience (UX) as it contributes to the improvement of the user's personal condition in relation to the computing system. The goals of affective design focus on providing users with an optimal, proactive experience. Amongst overlap with several fields, applications of affective design include ambient intelligence, human–robot interaction, and video games.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to thought (thinking):
User experience design defines the experience a user would go through when interacting with a company, its services, and its products.User experience design is a User Centered Design approach because it considers the user's experience when using a product or platform. Research, data analysis, and test results drive design decisions in UX design rather than aesthetic preferences and opinions. Unlike user interface design, which focuses solely on the design of a computer interface, UX design encompasses all aspects of a user's perceived experience with a product or website, such as its usability, usefulness, desirability, brand perception, and overall performance. UX design is also an element of the customer experience (CX), and encompasses all aspects and stages of a customer's experience and interaction with a company.
A user is a person who utilizes a computer or network service.
Human–computer interaction (HCI) is research in the design and the use of computer technology, which focuses on the interfaces between people (users) and computers. HCI researchers observe the ways humans interact with computers and design technologies that allow humans to interact with computers in novel ways. A device that allows interaction between human being and a computer is known as a "Human-computer Interface (HCI)".
A command-line interface (CLI) is a means of interacting with a computer program by inputting lines of text called command-lines. Command-line interfaces emerged in the mid-1960s, on computer terminals, as a user-friendly alternative to punched cards.
Human factors and ergonomics is the application of psychological and physiological principles to the engineering and design of products, processes, and systems. Primary goals of human factors engineering are to reduce human error, increase productivity and system availability, and enhance safety, health and comfort with a specific focus on the interaction between the human and equipment.
Joseph Henry 'Joe' Condon was an American computer scientist, engineer and physicist, who spent most of his career at Bell Labs. The son of Edward Condon and Emilie Honzik Condon, he was named after the 19th-century American physicist Joseph Henry.
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