Definition of Interaction Design- Revisited

A few months ago I started to define Interaction Design and when I look back now I can see that I have not really been able define it properly. All I had then were a few questions. All those questions had the same essence to it which can be summed up to form a single question, “Can interaction design be defined?”. I recently met one of my old friends and like any conversation would go he asked me what was I studying, and what did it mean. I tried to explain what Interaction Design was but I failed miserably as what he understood from our little conversation adding to whatever knowledge he had about my field, he inferred that I designed red and blue buttons. He said, “Oh I know what you do, you decide what button to use which color and why!.” I am a master’s student, studying Interaction Design in Carnegie Mellon University, and I realized that though it’s scary, but the fact remains that I could not define what I am studying.

I decided that I had to attempt at defining Interaction Design (for the sake of my career or this post) and thus, since many months I have searched for the definition in books, talked to people, peers, and questioned many of my professors for their understanding of Interaction Design and how they would define it.

Some of my readings :

In a conversation with Sebastiano Bagnara, Bill Moggridge was asked his take on what is Interaction Design? Bill Moggridge said, “Broadly, it’s the design of everything digital. Digital objects, digital services and digital experiences.”

Dave Malouf “This basic definition of Interaction Design (IxD) illustrates the common threads between definitions crafted by esteemed designers Dan Saffer1 and Robert Reimann2 as well as the Interaction Design Association3.
It’s also important to note that Interaction Design is distinct from the other design disciplines. It’s not Information Architecture, Industrial Design, or even User Experience Design. It also isn’t user interface design. Interaction design is not about form or even structure, but is more ephemeral — about why and when rather than about what and how.”

Cameron Tonkinwise, “The designer’s task was to mediate between the new technologies that were being developed and the lifestyles into which those new technologies might be inserted. The interfaces the designer created helped domesticate new technologies by establishing new habits of interaction.”

According to Bill Verplank, IxD is design for human use and has to answer three questions; “How do you do?”, “How do you feel?” and “How do you know?”.

Cooper, “The practice of “interaction design” grew from the need to present software experiences to users in a way that makes sense, meets their needs, is consistent and coherent and “usable” and ultimately desirable.”

“Interaction Design (IxD) defines the structure and behavior of interactive systems. Interaction designers strive to create meaningful relationships between people and the products and services that they use, from computers to mobile devices to appliances and beyond. Our practices are evolving with the world.” — The Interaction Design Association (IxDA)

My peer, Monique Smith writes,“I believe the primary function of interaction design is to help people accomplish their explicit — as well as implicit — goals in a responsible way.”

Chirag Murthy writes, “One big design container. All in one. ‘One design’. One design is the practice of design which encompasses anything and everything design under the sun, or even on and beyond it!.”

etc…

I soon realized that none of these definitions were exactly the same and none of them were right or wrong. These definitions were based on the their individual encounters with interaction design. They had varied context from Architecture, to computers, mobile screens, environments, fashion, websites, Psychology etc.. Basically I understood,

Anything and everything that could be designed to facilitate interactions with it or through it could be termed as interaction design.

So humans directly interacting with humans, humans interacting with computers, computers interacting with other computers, objects like posters, digital screens, mobile phones, watches, buildings, instillations etc interacting with humans, environments, communication, all is interaction design. But this broad understanding of interactions left me wondering, was interaction design everything under the sky and thus was it limitless? This brought me back to a question one of my professor, Molly Steenson had asked to probe us further. She asked, “If everything is interaction design, then is it possible that nothing is? What might the limits be (or are there limits)?” This question really pushed me to think further about interaction design and my role as a designer.

My take on this is,

If Interaction Design is everything, then it cannot be nothing.

Even if Interaction Design is designed for the “interactions” to be “invisible” or “ubiquitous” so that the user can have a seamless experience, without taking effort in the “act of interacting” and thus if all interactions were designed to be invisible it would still mean that interaction design is not “nothing” as it is present everywhere. It’s same as, if the glass is “full”, that cannot mean the glass is “empty”. But the question of Interaction Design being limitless still prevails. How can interaction design, being everything under the sky, be designed? How can a designer, design for those limitless interactions. I feel that interaction design is, limitless with no boundaries, no labels and not confined to fields (architecture, product design, engineer, graphic design etc).

But to design for interactions, has limits, these limits become constraints or values that help a designer to design interactions. Limits such as ethics, human behavior, safety, efficiency, utility, memorability, learnability etc.. These limits are the core design principles to design for interactions. But then these values can be guiding principles to design anything and everything making designing for interactions as similar to designing anything(product, service, logo etc). That’s the beauty of what I study, it cannot be contained, it cannot have a single definition, it’s limitless, it’s everywhere, it’s universal design.