Emotional Design: Donald Norman

In this video Donald Norman explains the importance of emotion in design. This is a beneficial video to watch because it makes you realise that even though a product may be very functional and work very well, it can still be ugly, thus sub-consciously making people think it is not a good product. He says "People used to say Norman's ok, but if you followed what he said everything would be usable, but it would be ugly."

He uses Philippe Starck's design of an orange juicer for Alessi which is very 'fun' in its form and aesthetics, but is practically useless. The one which Donald Norman owns is a gold plated special edition which has a warning label on it saying it shouldn't be used as a juicer because the acidity of the oranges will ruin the gold plating. Even though it has no function, he still owns one just because it's fun to look at.

Whenever we are interacting with a product, we are analysing it on three levels, Norman explains. First of all before we even touch the product our mind is performing visceral analysis. This is when we appreciate the beauty of a product subconsciously. Our brains are all biologically developed to like and dislike certain things, we like bright colours, dislike loud sounds, bitter tastes. Behavioural analysis also is sub-consciences, like our legs moving when we want to walk - we don't have to consciously tell our legs to move one in front of the other. In design this is when we feel we are in control. Norman uses the example of driving a high-performance sports car on a windy road, we like this because when we are driving around a corner we feel we are in complete control of the situation. The last level of analysis is the reflective. This is when we reflect on past experiences, things we have done, seen or heard about, and use this to form our opinion of the current situation.

Overall this video highlighted to me the fact that even if we didn't think about the emotion in a product we design, it will still have a emotion, even if we have not intended it to be there. This is hugely going to effect how people view and interact with the design, therefore it is a very important thing to harness. What Norman says "I always feel that pleasurable things work better" is very true for most people, they do automatically think that something that is enjoyable to look at and to use will work better.