Person-System Interaction and Designing: Re-Establishing Values
Robert Jerrard · Design Issues · 1993
Introduction The analysis of human factors for computer systems has developed into a multidisciplinary activity; acknowledgement of this fact has resulted in the particular methods and approaches used in considering interaction and adaptation to such machinery. In the past, the allocation of dials and levers on machine consoles was largely a result of limited methods of measurement. Sophisticated measurement methods which purport to apply themselves to all of the physical human senses involved in industrial tasks have been proposed. A wide variety of descriptive literature exists, often in the form of system-design guidelines, but experience of specialist users is rarely used; traditionally, system development is dependent upon empirical recorded data in specific areas of computer use allied to what is already known about human behavior. J. C. Newman suggests that psychologists and system designers must complement one another, and the only effective approach is to combine efforts in a direct involvement in system specifications.' Although this seems a logical way to proceed, one should take into account the radically changing nature of users and systems. Systems design strategy should, if possible, be fluid because absolute solutions are rare and dependent upon addressing moving targets. In recent years, there has been much more emphasis on user psychology in considerations of humans as information processors. Inevitable analogies are made between humans and digital computers in much the same way analogies were made between humans and telephone switchboards when they first became widespread. This process probably helps to describe computer systems in behavioral terms but does not effectively aid interaction. Furthermore, such an elevation of computer systems to types of beings actively hinders a user's approach; the machine rivals human capacities in the user's conception of it.