Cognitive Design

Smart phones are a new frontier for cognitive designers. Jobs, consulting and even R&D opportunities abound.  Figuring out how our minds work on mobile platforms and remaking services to better meet our cognitive, emotional, motivational and volitional needs is big business.  Using smart phones to learn, make more effective decisions, change unwanted behaviors and increase situational awareness are obvious opportunities for cognitive designers.   Less obvious are the challenges of figuring out psychological optimal ways of presenting ads (yikes!) and leveraging the unique properties of smart phones to act as sources of on-demand mental energy for managing stress (yea!).

I am always on the lookout for good research into the actual use and cognitive science of cell phones.  Take for example, a recent article in Personal and Ubiquitous Computing entitled, Habits Make Smart Phone Use More Pervasive.  The authors use designed-focused ethnographic techniques to peer into the lives of smart phone users.   They found people spending 2-2.5 hours on their phones each day in 90 second bursts (median time) exercising a checking habit and seeking information rewards.

“Checking habit: brief, repetitive inspection of dynamic content quickly accessible on the device”

Some interactions were even shorter (few seconds) as people turned on their phone’s screen to check notification icons or the time.

Just as we naturally scan the physical environment seeking interesting things to see, hear, touch, smell or taste we are now regularly checking cyberspace for interesting things to see and hear. A new innovation frontier for cognitive design is open wide!