Human Factors in Interaction Design



Human factors aim to help humans to do their work the best while maintaining the overall system performance and improve tenacity. The ultimate goal of the Human Factors is to minimizing system errors and optimizing efficiency.

Human errors are common occurrences in the workplace. Mistakes will be made and you can't always prevent it from happening. But Human Factors will make sure of its minimum impact.

Humans are at the center of any product or service so it needs to be human-centered. Human Factors contribute towards this Human-centered products extensively.

The human factors field is highly adaptable to different situations as purposes and interaction keep changing depending on the situation and workplace. In simple word, human factors are nothing but study of the interaction between the user and the product they're using and using this studied data to create safer and effective interactions.

Human Factors as discipline came into existence during WW2 when problems occurred in the design of machines operated by humans.

These are some of the human Factors in Interaction design-

Short span of concentration-

Concentration window of the user is very short. Designing the product which will accommodate this short span of attention and work smoothly with displaying the needed factors easily.
Information Placement-

User needs the information placed in a way that the complex input can be made easier. Complex information needs to be placed hierarchically, etc.

Prefer to learn by doing than by explanation-

User usually doesn’t like the tutorials as the user prefer to learn the particular product by using rather than the explanation. Making easier tutorials without the bombardment of information can help user.

Prefer standard ways of doing things-

User is habitual to certain ways of things. This is one of the heuristic of UX. Make things consistent to the other products user is already using with innovative inputs. This cuts down the learning curve and keeps the user on your product or site.

Physical inability

Designing for accessibility is just as important. Keeping in mind the group of user who might have different kinds of physical inability and designing accordingly is the need of the hour.

Error prevention-

User is prone to making errors. Error prevention by giving the user clues can help make the experiences smoother.

These are just a few human factors we should keep in mind while designing interactions. The list goes on according to the research and the type of product you’re working on. Human factors are sometimes taken same as ‘Usability ‘or ‘HCI.’

Interested in UX Design? We have so many other interesting UX Blogs on Design Thinking and UX / UI Design

By Rutuja Sanjay / May 21, 2019

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