{"id":5256,"date":"2024-08-08T17:47:59","date_gmt":"2024-08-08T17:47:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/?p=5256"},"modified":"2024-08-08T21:35:58","modified_gmt":"2024-08-08T21:35:58","slug":"decoding-design-psychology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/decoding-design-psychology\/","title":{"rendered":"Decoding Design Psychology"},"content":{"rendered":"

A journey through the intersections of design and the mind by Rachel A.Wood\u00a0<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

There are different estimates of the number of designers who come from a psychology \ud835\udebf background, but in human centred design – estimates are likely to be around 10-20%.<\/strong> Being as I am passionate about psychology (which much of my past education is in) and design in terms of practice as well as research; I thought it might be interesting to explore its intersectional history, and to look to see what I could further adopt in both service and co-design.<\/p>\n

\"Figure
Figure 1: Sketch by Rachel A.Wood ‘Holding a Neuron \u2013 an Allegory of Prototyping’ (2013)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

What have I learnt or re-learnt?<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n

\u201cThe psychology of design has a tremendous impact influence on the success and sustainability of design by triggering associations and displaying demand characteristics…\u201d (Carbon, 2019, p. 1)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"Figure
Figure 2: \u2018The Golden Brain\u2019 – 3D Printed by Colin Wood (2024)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

This has been a much more curious adventure than I was originally expecting when I first started. To start it off, I asked other practitioners initially on social media about what concepts and theories people working in this area would like me to focus on first. This brought in a real broad range of interesting and inspiring answers, and so I next asked which three areas were currently being seen as the most important.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Figure
Figure 3: Preparation Poll for this blog<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

 <\/p>\n

The top three answers<\/strong> to the poll were given as follows:<\/p>\n

Prospect theory<\/strong> (explaining how people make decisions based on risks)<\/p>\n

Cognitive theory<\/strong> (explaining the way that we process experiences and preferences)<\/p>\n

Gestalt theory<\/strong> (explaining the way that we simplify and organise information)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As the result of these answers, I then sought to find out (or remind myself) when these theories were first established. In terms of books, I found this was:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Cognitive theory in 1864, Gestalt theory in 1874, and Prospect theory in 1928<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The first two I remember well from my early psychological studies \u2013 however prospect theory at the time seemed to have passed me by. But of course, it is quite possible that it was referred to as something else at the time. I still have all my original books, and so one day I will most definitely look through them page by page to see if I can find any mentions of it (it might take me a while as it was mostly pre digital).\u00a0Taking each one at a time I decided to look at practical uses for these theories. In the end this was focused on –<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Decision making under risk and uncertainty (Prospect theory):<\/strong><\/p>\n

This theory (of bias) is based on the ideas of Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky in 1979, which was extended in 1992. They conducted a series of experiments to explore how people make decisions under uncertainty. This seemed to show that we are not always rational in this process and can develop \u2018loss aversion\u2019 as a bias.\u00a0Basically, according to this theory we see losses, and gains differently. Losses will typically be felt more emotionally<\/strong> than equivalent gains that we might have. This has also been used to examine why there can be a reluctance or resistance to change when we are presented with these choices. This can be applied in both service design, and co-design practice as follows:<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Improving engagement and motivation with services through framing and presenting information in a way that emphasises what could be lost if something is not done or applied or used.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Working in a strength-based way as I always try to do, can make this approach feel very counterintuitive. However, I have found that it is possible to celebrate and appreciate, whilst effectively acknowledging this bias for risk in losses. A way of doing this is to highlight the strengths of a service re-design, whilst at the same time exploring the risk to future satisfaction rates (and market share if applicable) if continuous improvement is then not applied to build on the design further. For clarity prospect theory is not the same as the often cited \u2018nudge\u2019 technique (positively encouraging behaviour in small steps, without restricting choices). This is an entirely different but complimentary psychological theory which has the potential to build and enhance on prospect theory.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Personalisation (Cognitive theory):<\/strong><\/p>\n

I asked a family member last year why he thought that I had always liked things with my name on. We didn\u2019t come up with a particular conclusion \u2013 but because of this blog and a random personalised impactful e-mail that I received, I started to think about how this is being applied through design. Turns out this is using our shared knowledge of the \u2018cocktail party effect\u2019<\/strong>. This human bias response was first discovered by Colin Cherry a British Engineer and Cognitive Scientist. He was originally exploring our understanding of how people might attend to a single conversation at a party (Cherry, C. 1953). From this we have built an understanding of:<\/p>\n

    \n
  • Survival mechanisms<\/strong> \u2013 using our name indicates something important may need our immediate attention.<\/li>\n
  • Sense of identity<\/strong> \u2013 using our name forms part of our identity and increases our memories and engagement with something (or an experience).<\/li>\n
  • Social connection<\/strong> \u2013 using our name helps us establish connections to others and can create a sense of belonging with those around us.<\/li>\n
  • Attention and memory<\/strong> \u2013 personalised messages are more likely to come to our attention more quickly.<\/li>\n
  • Relevance and importance<\/strong> \u2013 using our name carries the implication that the message is directly for us and is highly relevant.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

     <\/p>\n

    Motivation in Co-design (Cognitive theory):<\/strong><\/p>\n

    \n

    \u00a0<\/strong>\u201cIt leverages the users\u2019 expertise about their own experiences, and psychology to create more effective, and user-friendly solutions\u201d (Sanders and Stappers, 2008, p.6).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

     <\/p>\n

    This in practice terms is particularly relevant to when co-design is applied in service design. This means that we tend to be more motivated by something that we partially at least created ourselves. This concept was founded on the ideas of Michael Norton, Daniel Mochon, and Dan Ariely in 2012. What is interesting in this idea is that even though the result might be of slightly lower quality (and in my case in terms of home DIY it usually is!) it is much more likely to be adopted and appreciated. The main justifications of this in the literature is as follows:<\/p>\n

      \n
    • Effort Justification<\/strong> \u2013 This comes down to one of my most favourite of psychological theories \u2018cognitive dissonance\u2019 <\/strong>(Festinger, 1957) \u2013 we experience discomfort when holding conflicting beliefs or attitudes, and strive to reduce it by justification, rationalising, or changing our thoughts and actions). <\/strong>In this context this basically means as it was harder to achieve an action, and took a fair amount of time, we feel more justified in what we feel is the outcome).<\/li>\n
    • Endowment Effect<\/strong> \u2013 This means we give more value to something that we have invested our own time into, and therefore find the concept of \u2018ownership\u2019 much more comfortable.<\/li>\n
    • Competence and Accomplishment \u2013 <\/strong>This means that if we have been able to learn and feel accomplished (\u2018self-efficacy\u2019 \u2013 Bandura, 1977) \u2013 confidence in your own ability) through solving a problem, that we will feel a sense of empowerment and satisfaction.<\/li>\n
    • Identity and Self Expression \u2013 <\/strong>When we contribute our own energy to something, it is more likely to be taken into our sense of identity. We are all more likely to value something more if we can see ourselves in it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

       <\/p>\n

      Service Design and Gestalt Theory<\/strong><\/p>\n

      \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

      \n

      \u201cThe Gestalt Psychologists showed that people perceive the whole before they see the parts, and what they see depends on their expectations, and previous knowledge.\u201d (Norman, 1988, 2013)<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

       <\/p>\n

      Interestingly for this blog, this book (\u2018The Design of Everyday Things\u2019) was first published as \u2018The Psychology of Everyday Things!\u2019, The reasons for that change are also of great interest to a pracademic (for someone who is both a practitioner, and an academic).<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      In my working life I first encountered Gestalt in the 1990s whilst training to be a facilitator, and in my psychology education (albeit a few years later).\u00a0It took quite a lot of thought to see how this can be applied in service design, until I thought about service patterns (reusable best practice solutions to service interactions). This can help us create experiences that are both coherent and intuitive, such as how do I apply for something. Using this can guide a designer to:<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      Gestalt principle \u2013 Proximity:<\/strong> grouping related functions for applications together.<\/p>\n

      Gestalt principle \u2013 Similarity:<\/strong> unifying branding identity across on-line and off-line \u2018touchpoints\u2019 (means of communicating and engaging).<\/p>\n

      Gestalt principle \u2013 Continuity:<\/strong> Guiding someone through phases of a service (such as you may have documented in a journey map \u2013 the way that we think people are using and will be using a service in the future) in a way that is seamless, even if part of the relationship, or transaction is on-line and some off-line (in-person delivery). An example would be applying, booking an appointment, paying, managing your account, completing, and reviewing.<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      As part of this blog journey, I also wanted to link design psychology in relation to a specific design method and tool. I decided to focus on personas [\u2018What matters to me\u2019]. \u00a0As well as requiring extensive design research, these are often used to look at how a human might interact with a service, and what their needs, goals and preferences might be. There are three main approaches that have been documented, and written about in the following classifications:<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

        \n
      • Demographic \u2013 social science, and social psychology.<\/strong> Uses quantifiable aspects of groups such as age, gender, and even generations.<\/li>\n
      • Behavioural \u2013 psychology\/behavioural science.<\/strong> How someone behaves, interacts and engages with a service, system, product or activity. This is typically depicted in customer journeys, service blueprints, usage rates, loyalty and purchase and subscription rates.<\/li>\n
      • Psychographic \u2013 psychology.<\/strong> This looks at connecting with people on a much deeper level, with a focus on personality, lifestyle choices, values, attitudes and beliefs.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

         <\/p>\n

        These are sometimes depicted by commentators as ascending in complexity such as (1) Demographic -> (2) Behavioural -> (3) Psychographic.<\/strong> However, from first-hand experience they all have important uses, depending on what your design brief or project is focussed on, and what the ultimate outcomes are.<\/p>\n

         <\/p>\n

        The similarities and differences between psychology and the behavioural sciences is a very interesting topic (which would most definitely warrant a whole blog on its own!) but hopefully the following is a fair summary.\u00a0Both are closely related and complimentary and relate to the study of human behaviour. They both aim to improve our well-being, and the way that society functions (such as through services, systems, policies and practices):<\/p>\n

         <\/p>\n

        Psychology<\/strong> = this area of study looks at mental processes (largely unobservable such as through stories and words) that includes a focus on perception, cognition, emotion, and motivations, as well as the physiology and neurological processes that support these.<\/p>\n

        Behavioural Science<\/strong> = focuses on observable actions (in this case humans and includes the measurable, and numbers). It also looks at how groups, and individuals act in different environments.<\/p>\n

         <\/p>\n

        I am not sure which one I would classify myself as, on this basis, but probably a little of both (very appropriate for a mixed methods researcher).\u00a0In terms of my own persona [what matters to me], here are some examples of descriptions to illustrate the differences in the ways that these can be expressed:<\/p>\n

          \n
        • Demographic<\/strong> (1) I am \u2018generation X\u2019 [social group] (2) Essex, UK based [geographic] (3) Design Strategist (Full time) and Researcher (Part time) [occupational groups]<\/li>\n
        • Behavioural<\/strong> (1) Tends to be an \u2018 [1]<\/strong> early adopter (lighthouse customer)\u2019 (2) Spends a lot of time thinking about, and doing behaviour change work, using psychology and design (3) Is a heavy user of on-line task planners to manage projects<\/li>\n
        • Psychographic<\/strong> (1) Loves psychology and design and using them together (2) Has positive attitudes to appreciative (strength based) inquiry (3) Is very keen to further her knowledge of making behaviour change implementable through design.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n

          I also wanted to re-trace and learn more in this area about how the integration of these could work for the good in the profession. In the end, in my search for the intersections I found around [2]<\/strong> fifteen main variations of design psychology in the way that is has been described. When I set myself down this path, I had no idea that the history could be traced back as far as to the year 1832.<\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          Design Psychology 1832, Psychology of Experience 1840, Experience Psychology 1866, Marketing Psychology 1887, Consumer Psychology 1890, Consumer Behaviour 1893, Behavioural Psychology 1937, Cognitive Design 1940, Neuroarchitecture 1940, Social Psychology of Design 1961, Behavioural Design 1963, UX Psychology 1988, CX Psychology 1999, Psychitecture 2003, and Neuro Design 2017<\/strong><\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          I also tracked the use of design and \u00a0psychology in mention hashtags, as I wanted to try and found out about how many conversations might be taking place using these variations (very proxy I know!). On [3]<\/strong> one day in early August 2024, I found the following number of posts being quoted on one [4]<\/strong> social media site:<\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          #ConsumerBehaviour<\/b> \u2013 72.6k posts<\/p>\n

          #MarketingPsychology<\/b> \u2013 20.6k posts<\/p>\n

          #NeuroDesign<\/b> \u2013 14.7k posts<\/p>\n

          #Neuroarchitecture<\/b> \u2013 13.8k posts<\/p>\n

          #DesignPsychology<\/b> \u2013 11.8k posts<\/p>\n

          #ConsumerPsychology<\/b> \u2013 10.5k posts<\/p>\n

          #BehaviouralPsychology<\/b> \u2013 5000+ posts<\/p>\n

          #BehaviouralDesign<\/b> \u2013 1000+ posts<\/p>\n

          #CXPsychology<\/b> \u2013 1000+ posts<\/p>\n

          #PsychologyOfDesign<\/b> \u2013 1000+ posts<\/p>\n

          #UXPsychology<\/b> \u2013 1000+ posts<\/p>\n

          #Psychitecture<\/b> \u2013 500+posts<\/p>\n

          #ExperiencePsychology<\/b> \u2013 fewer than 100 posts<\/p>\n

          #CognitiveDesign<\/b> \u2013 fewer than 100 posts<\/p>\n

          #SocialPsychologyOfDesign<\/b> \u2013 no posts located<\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          \ud835\udebf Where am I with this now, and what will I do next?<\/strong><\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          Exploring the history and the intersections of design and psychology, has been a healthy reminder to always stop and reflect on the principles that maybe affecting our everyday work, and the future decisions that we support as designers. There\u2019s a great deal for me to explore further, and learn from, but most of all this little journey has become a sort of love letter to two things that I will be forever<\/strong> passionate about.<\/strong> I haven\u2019t yet decided whether this all means that my profession is Psychitecture or something else! But anyway, to all those of you that have contributed to this journey, a big thank you\u2026\u2026<\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          \n

          \u201cAs humans, we have underlying \u2018blueprints\u2019 for how we perceive and process the world around us, and the study of psychology helps us decipher this blueprint\u201d (Yablonski, 2020, preface).<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

           <\/p>\n

          References:<\/strong><\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          Bandura, A. (1977), Towards a Unifying Theory of Behavioural Change, Psychological Review,<\/em> 1977, 84, pp. 191 – 215<\/p>\n

          Carbon, C-C., (2019), The Psychology of Design, Design Science<\/em>, vol. 5, Article e26<\/p>\n

          Cherry, E.C., (1953), Some experiments on the recognition of speech, with one and two ears, Journal of the Acoustic Society of America<\/em>, 25, pp. 975\u2013979<\/p>\n

          Festinger, L. (1957), A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance, Evanston, IL: Row, Peterson<\/p>\n

          Norman, D (1988, 2013), The Design of Everyday Things, Basic Books, New York<\/p>\n

          Norton, M., Mochon, D. and Ariely, D. (2012), The Ikea Effect: When Labor leads to love, Journal of Consumer Psychology<\/em>, vol. 22 (3), pp. 453-460<\/p>\n

          Roger, E.M. (1995), Diffusion of Innovation, New York, Free Press<\/p>\n

          Tversky, A. and Kahneman, D. eds., (2000). Choices, values, and frames, New York: Cambridge University Press<\/p>\n

          Sanders, E.B.N. and Stappers, P.J., (2008), Co-creation and the new landscapes of design.\u00a0Co-design<\/em>,\u00a04<\/em>(1), pp.5-18.<\/p>\n

          Yablonski, J. (2020), Laws of UX: Using Psychology to Design Better Products and Services, O\u2019Reilly Media<\/p>\n

           <\/p>\n

          [1] Rogers, E (1962), Diffusion of Innovations: Customer Types are – Innovators, Early Adopters, Early Majority, Late Majority, and Laggards<\/p>\n

          [2] Using a combination of Google NGram Viewer (I applied from 1800 in English and Case Insensitive, and Google Scholar)<\/p>\n

          [3] The latest hashtag mentions tracking that I did for this blog was 5th<\/sup> August 2024<\/p>\n

          [4] The number of post mentions was taken from Instagram<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

          A journey through the intersections of design and the mind by Rachel A.Wood\u00a0 There are different estimates of the number of designers who come from a psychology \ud835\udebf background, but in human centred design – estimates are likely to be around 10-20%. Being as I am passionate about psychology (which much of my past education […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":46,"featured_media":5261,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,264],"tags":[58,351,278,352,341],"class_list":["post-5256","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-design-research","category-design-theory","tag-co-design","tag-design-psychology","tag-human-centred-design","tag-psychology","tag-service-design"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5256","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/46"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5256"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5256\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5278,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5256\/revisions\/5278"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5256"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5256"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5256"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}