Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs | UX design
An understanding of how users think and how they behave in response to sensory information is essential to design, but at the heart of human actions is the desire to satisfy certain needs. Abraham Maslow, an American psychologist (1908–1970) and prominent advocate of viewing people in terms of their drives as opposed to a “bag of symptoms”, provided one of the most well-known accounts of human needs in what we now call ‘Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs’. As you can see from the graphic above, Maslow’s hierarchy has since been demonstrated in the form of a pyramid to emphasize the increasing complexity of human needs.
The most basic human needs are shown at the bottom of the hierarchy, and these are the physiological drives that ensure survival, including the need for air, food, water, and sleep.
Our physiological needs are then followed by our safety needs, which include protection, security, law, stability, and safety for our loved ones.
Assuming the central layer of the hierarchy are our relationship needs or the desire for love and belonging; this level includes the need for family, affection, friendships, and sexual intimacy.
Now we have the esteem needs, which include self-esteem, confidence, reputation, and respect for oneself and from others.
At the top of the hierarchy or pyramid are the needs connected to self-actualization, which refers to “the curative force in psychotherapy — man’s tendency to actualise himself to become his potentialities…to express and activate all the capacities of the organism”
As designers, we must consider the types of needs we are targeting with our products so as to grab the customer’s/user’s attention and accentuate the positive aspects of both owning and using them.
