User-Centred Design and Human Interaction

Summary

The rapidly changing consumer environment has led the University of Huddersfield to consider a greater focus in its undergraduate Design provision upon understanding customer requirements.
The rapidly changing consumer environment has led the University of Huddersfield to consider a greater focus in its undergraduate Design provision upon understanding customer requirements.
At present the Department of Design incorporates within Design methodology, components such as Marketing Research; measuring feedback and analysing markets/trends and investigating new product development. Customer profiling is also used to identify psychographic characteristics; socio-economic data; disposable income evaluation and segmentation analysis. Visual image research is also employed using mood boards to capture lifestyle scenarios, trend predictions and forecasting.
The Department is now looking towards moving the preoccupation with the -tangible- physical object (form, line, structure etc) as the means of providing the -correct- solution, to the context and environment of the user with the -intangible- (feelings, perception, culture and experience).
The focus of this user-centred design approach will vary considerably according to different disciplines but the common denominator will be to develop methodologies which access human experience. Both explicit and tacit knowledge investigation will occur by gathering information on human behaviour ranging from oral communication to ergonomic/anthropometric data to investigating human aspirations and desires.
The paper will discuss the developments so far at the University of Huddersfield and the changing relationship within Design Education and business. What is abundantly clear in our view is that the Design education components of the 21st century will be quite different from those of the 20th century with a much greater emphasis on user-centred design and human interaction which satisfy the needs and aspira

This paper was first published on the earlier Egytex website. The text above is the summary that was published there.