The author's primary focus in this chapter was to distinguish between visceral, behavioral, and reflective design. Visceral design involves "the wow factor." It is the kind of design that intends to make objects look aesthetically pleasing. Visceral design can be viewed as shallow and superficial, because the only thing that really matters is how the product looks and the initial reaction of users or consumers. Some visceral principles include bright, highly saturated primary colors, and prominent physical features such as look, feel, and sound. The author also discussed behavioral design, which revolves around use. With behavioral design, qualities such as appearance and rationale are unimportant, whereas function, understandability, usability, and physical feel are key. Norman mentioned how recent developments in computers and software have detracted from behavioral design, because these new innovations take control away from the user and put it in the hands of a machine. Norman also discussed how activities such as cooking play into this behavioral aspect of design. Cooking involves physical feelings such as chopping, slicing, and grating, and many sounds like sizzling and crunching. A third key point of the chapter was reflective design, which pertains to message, culture, and the meaning of a product or its use. This helps establish one's self image and the way that a person sees himself or herself. With strong reflective design, a person wants to buy a product because it has prestige, perceived rarity, or exclusiveness. In addition to these three different kinds of design, the chapter discussed two types of product development: enhancement and innovation. Enhancement involves taking an existing product and making it better, while innovation involves finding a new way of doing something. Enhancements are easier to come up with than innovations, and require watching how people use what exists today, discovering difficulties, and overcoming them. A quote from the chapter that I found especially pertinent to this chapter and the class overall was "Everyday things have to be used by a wide variety of people: short and tall, athletic and not, who speak and read different languages, who may be deaf or blind, or lack physical mobility or agility - or even hands." This explains both the necessity and challenge of efficient design.
This chapter from "Emotional Design" is similar to the selected reading from "The Design of Everyday Things," and draws from many of the same concepts and ideas. Both chapters stressed the importance of "natural design." This is a common sense way of designing objects in a way that is clear to consumers and users and makes them feel like they know how to use the product before they even take it out of the packaging. Another similarity between the two chapters was that both included numerous examples that pertained to each of the author's key points. In this chapter from "Emotional Design," Norman explained several situations and examples relating to visceral, behavioral, and reflective design. This style of writing made the chapter much easier both to read and to understand. If the chapter was just 30 pages of notes about design, it would be very difficult to absorb any of the author's messages.
From personal experience, something that succeeds as visceral design was the restaurant I ate dinner at last night, Zazio's in the Radisson hotel in downtown Kalamazoo. The author's example of the restaurant in downtown Chicago reminded me of my own personal example. The restaurant's sign had an inviting layout of brightly colored, interestingly shaped letters. The inside of the restaurant was beautifully designed, with many of the walls shaped in long curves instead of straight lines. Where the walls met the ceiling, neon lighting illuminated the walls in bright orange and blue colors. The kitchen, which was visible from the dining area, had an extremely bright and bold backsplash of orange tiles. Finally, the bar was backed with a huge piece of fogged glass, with many illuminated bottles on the shelves. The design made me feel like I had enjoyed a great meal before I even started eating. Something that succeeds as behavioral design is my tennis racquet. I bought the racquet primarily because after trying out several different models, I found that this one has the best feel and the most control. In other words, this racquet allows me to play tennis at my highest possible level. Aspects such as appearance and color were not important factors when choosing the racquet. Rather, I focused on the performance of the object. Finally, something that succeeds as reflective design is my Oakley sunglasses. I could buy a pair of sunglasses from a drug store for one twentieth of the price I paid for the Oakley's, but something about the brand and the company's reputation makes me want the higher quality, more exclusive glasses. I always feel stupid when I tell people I like their sunglasses and they tell me they bought them from Rite-Aid for eight dollars, but when I picture myself in the summer, I can't see myself without a pair of Oakley's.
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