Book review
The Psychology of Everyday Things
Basic Books; Reprint edition, April 1, 1988 (272pp)
Authors: Donald A Norman
Review by Donald Clark - Epic
This classic book is as relevant now as it was when
it was published, over 16 years ago. Norman takes a wry look at
product design in everyday objects such as VCRs, computers, telephones,
car windows, dashboards, doors etc. to show good and bad practice.
It’s full of great examples explaining why people push when
they should pull, click the wrong buttons and generally fail to
complete the simplest of everyday tasks.
His advice is straightforward and has plenty of relevance in e-learning
and web design. It will really change the way you view design.
His first rule is ‘Design for usability’. Usability,
or ease of use, is paramount. Don’t make navigation difficult.
Make things visible – don’t keep the user in the dark.
A good example of how this goes wrong in e-learning is the poor
use of icons in navigation. Programmes sometimes have graphics that
look like icons but are not active, merely illustrative. You click
on them and nothing happens. Even worse, you may click on an icon
and something unexpected happens. The icon may even be meaningless.
In practice, icons may have to be supported by text, even if it
does upset the Art Director.
Mapping is another of his principles in design. To steer a car
you turn the wheel to the right to go right and left to go left.
This is mapping. Apply this to navigation on the screen. To go forward
the arrow should face to the right and left to go back.
In general, in navigation, feedback (another Norman design principle)
is also important. You need to know when you’ve arrived at
a destination.
The book is amusing and full of interesting (some now dated) examples
of bad design. One word of warning. For a book on design, it’s
rather poorly designed. The structure is all over the place and
principles difficult to extract. Nevertheless, this is still a ‘must
read’ for those who are serious about HCI.
Whatever your professional interest, on finishing the book you’ll
find yourself checking out dashboards in cars, toasters, mobile
phones etc. All of your direct contact with technology will get
the Norman treatment.
The comments on the cover say it all:
'We are all victimised by the natural perversity of inanimate objects.
Here is a book that strikes back…..’
Isaac Isomov
‘An exciting and entertaining book full of stories about
how things are designed and how they ought to be designed’
Roger Schank
This brilliant book shows how good designers exploit basic principles
of common-sense thought’
Marvin Minsky
|
