Abstract
The science of affordance and designing products with affordances are vital for maximizing user-product interaction. However, this interaction is certainly not simple and straightforward, as alluded to by Ophardt and Jamieson in their paper on the modern bathroom experience. Their work on challenges associated with interactive gestures and a system’s response to these gestures brings to mind the classic work by the famous psychologist, James Gibson, who coined the term affordance, as well the work of Don Norman, who defined affordances as perceivable action possibilities in the context of design. Ophardt and Jamieson emphasized the complexities of human-centered design principles concerning gestural interfaces in public restroom designs by categorizing modern fixtures as technological attendants and exploring the challenges associated with each attendant. In the era of IoT and smart devices, the work of Ophardt and Jamieson, which critically examines the importance of interactive gestural interfaces vis-à-vis user experience, cannot be stressed enough. These authors have made their analysis of a simple “public restroom experience” an informative and thought-provoking work.
On a slightly different topic, other critically important work can be found in the research conducted on school-aged children by Kantosalo and Riihiaho. With 9- to 10-year-old children as users, Kantosalo and Riihiaho evaluated the usability of an artificial intelligence–based computational creativity system called the Poetry Machine. The authors evaluated this system using peer tutoring with paired interviews as well as group testing with a new feedback game. Although time-consuming, peer tutoring provided detailed information on the usability problems, while group testing with a new feedback game was efficient in the early phases of development for testing new ideas and detecting missing features. These authors have demonstrated an exceptional approach for usability testing with a user group that is difficult to evaluate and collect feedback on since cognitive, motor, and perceptual skills in children are still developing at this age.
In the previous edition of EID, a paper from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, described students’ design projects utilizing ergonomics and design education in finding ergonomics solutions for industry. Another outstanding example of research with students can be found in the current issue. Wanberg and colleagues from the Metropolitan State University of Denver, who report on a unique approach in educating their design students on ergonomics through a long-term, hands-on “Alternative Vehicle Design” project. Utilizing already published anthropometric data sets, student researchers learned how to apply the existing data sets to the user population and worked on the feasibility, or lack thereof, in the applicability of these existing data sets to users while designing aspects of the vehicle, such as the interior, seating, and controls. The students utilized physical mockups, got feedback from end-users, and learned to make iterative enhancements per user requirements, resulting in the creation of a functional mockup. Throughout this human-centered project, the authors worked side by side with student researchers providing real-time mentoring. I am sure the student researchers gained knowledge from this real-world course that will be etched in their memories forever. As an ergonomics professional, I view this experiential learning process as arguably one of the most well thought out, effective pedagogies in ergonomics coursework. Hats off to Wanberg et al. for this ongoing, pioneering project.
As always, I would like to acknowledge the excellent contributions of senior and associate editors as well as ad hoc reviewers in helping us to publish manuscripts in a timely fashion. Last but not least, let us make EID the premiere platform for design-minded human factors and ergonomics professionals around the world.
