Emotion & Design: Affect & Design
The popular belief is that aesthetics have the potential to influence users at the visceral, behavioral, and reflective levels of processing.
“If the product is something fundamental to life and well-being, then the proper response is to ignore continual shifts in popular sentiment and aim for long-lasting value. Yes, the product must be attractive. Yes, it should be pleasurable and fun. But it must also be effective, understandable, and appropriately priced. In other words, it must strive for balance among the three levels of design.”
— Don Norman (2005) in “Emotional Design: Why we love (or hate) everyday things”
Attractive things not only make us feel positive but also influence us in terms of how we interact and think about such things. Even slight changes to the visual appeal of products, situations, and even workplaces have been found to influence productivity.
For example, a recent study conducted by psychology researcher Marlon Nieuwenhuis at Cardiff University and her colleagues (2014) found offices with plants (i.e. ‘green’ offices) reported employees were happier and showed higher rates of productivity than offices with a ‘lean’ design (i.e. stark offices with no greenery).
It would be nonchalant to simply say aesthetics make things better; taken as a whole, aesthetics encompasses a myriad of different considerations, and a misstep on any of these can make the design and user experience worse. The things we found attractive, stylish or appealing ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty years ago are, for the most part, are things we see from our current viewpoint as old-fashioned (although some things we appreciate as ‘retro’) and outdated. So, we are constantly dealing with changing attitudes of aesthetic appeal. This means aesthetics is something of a moving target, emphasizing the challenge facing us all as designers.
Aesthetics in an ever-changing world:
Firstly, concentrate on the product. Many of the answers should be found by focusing on what exactly you are designing. For example, a website selling clothes should convey this message instantly, which means the designers must limit the amount of distraction on arrival.
Secondly, keep things simple. If you manage to reduce the time it takes to identify the necessary element or object, the users/consumers can concentrate on the task at hand and improve their productivity as a result.
Thirdly, keep things functional, effective, and transparent. While there is pressure to bend and weave so as to stay in time with the prevailing styles and fashions, functionality, effectiveness, and transparency are just as likely to attract users and consumers.
Conclusion
This is by no means an edict or a sure-fire approach to achieving aesthetic appeal, especially if you are working in an industry based on the prevailing fashions of the time. However, thanks to your concentrating on functionality, appropriateness, simplicity, and transparency, the obstacles that often face users are lowered, allowing them to devote their attention to the important aspects of using and interacting with a particular product.
