Cognitive Design

Sensory perceptions often trigger affect. That is, when I see, hear, smell, touch or taste something, I find it pleasant or unpleasant to some degree (valence) and that in turn activates other mental states (arousal).  It is generally thought that affect is partially determined by the objective nature of the sensory experience but it is also strong shaped by what I expect to perceive or the encodings of the mental model I use to interpret the experience.  Affect as valence (pleasantness) + activation (arousal) has been studied for extreme states such a love, fear, joy, hate and so on.   This leaves open the question of the role of affect with everyday objects or those with little valence and/or activation.  Does affect play an important role in our mental processes and behaviors with everyday objects?

According to recent research  from the Center for the Neural Basis for Computation at Carnegie Mellon University the answer is yes – there are so-called micro valences that do in fact shape our decisions and behaviors.  Interestingly, these micro valences are an intrinsic part of our mental representation of objects, they are not judgments or values we attach after perception.

“Much in the same way that we automatically perceive the shape, size, or color of objects, we cannot help but perceive the valence in objects. In this sense, valence is not a label applied after the fact to perceptual entities, but rather is an intrinsic element of visual perception with the same mental status as other object properties.”

This has important implications for cognitive designers.  It suggests that low activation events are still driven by affect (i.e. a micro valence) even though there are no obvious emotions involved. Everyday objects are boring. And small differences can change the outcome of a decision.  Also, micro valences can expand our understanding of the higher-level object properties that inform the construction of mental models (see figure). This could be important for psychographics.

Imagine being able to shape choice and modify behaviors around the use of everyday objects by making a very small change to features and functions. In principle this should be possible if we understand the micro valences at work.

Imagine being able to design an experience that is so powerful it transforms  someone with a deep fear of spiders into someone that could touch a tarantula.  Now imagine this designed experience is only 3 hours long and creates lasting effects on the brain regions associated with fear that can be detected with a brain scan 6 months later!

That is exactly what researchers at Northwestern University achieved in a study of 12 adults with lifelong debilitating spider phobias.   Participants went through a single  3-hour session of exposure therapy as described below.

“During the therapy, participants were taught about tarantulas and learned their catastrophic thoughts about them were not true. “They thought the tarantula might be capable of jumping out of the cage and on to them,” Hauner said. “Some thought the tarantula was capable of planning something evil to purposefully hurt them. I would teach them the tarantula is fragile and more interested in trying to hide herself. “

They gradually learned to approach the tarantula in slow steps until they were able to touch the outside of the terrarium. Then they touched the tarantula with a paintbrush, a glove and eventually pet it with their bare hands or held it.

“They would see how soft it was and that its movements were very predictable and controllable,” Hauner said. “Most tarantulas aren’t aggressive, they just have a bad reputation.”

The cognitive and behavioral features of this experience design are clear. The question for innovators is will they work to produce rapid, deep and lasting behavior change in other contexts?

More generally, is exposure therapy a reusable design pattern for shifting mental models and producing lasting behavior change?

Too good to be true?

It drips with cognitive design possibilities. Check out the video and product website.

With a mountain of behavior-based health problems, ethical concerns and spending problems that answer is no!

There are lots of demands on our time but even more demands on our mental energy.  Watching, thinking, learning, deciding, stressing and controlling our own emotions, impulses and behavior all take a tremendous amount of mental energy.   As we start to run out of mental energy our cognitive performance and willpower begin to slip.  If our supply of mental energy runs too low our attempts to stick to our goals, resist impulses, manage biases when making decisions, learn deeply and other attempts at conscious self-regulation fail.

Mental energy is a limited resource.

Mental energy appears to be more than biological energy and brain sugar. There are subjective components including a sense of vigor and motivation.  This means our attempt to manage mental energy should include both psychological and biological interventions.  This point is illustrated well in a recent post of the science of willpower blog that look at temptations that actually boost our willpower. The temptations  include psychological tactics such as watching others pursue goals (e.g. reality TV) or a humorous or cute video as well as biological tactics including naps, snacks and caffeine.

From a cognitive design standpoint these are great tactics because they can be integrated easily into daily life, are science-based and avoid the paradox of using willpower to build willpower (we naturally want to do them).

Interestingly, the science behind some of these claims (those focused on glucose) have recently come into question.   For example, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania claim that the  Brain’s Willpower is not Fueled by Glucose.  This might signal a larger role for psychological tactics or even a powerful placebo effect.

Understanding the nature of mental energy and how to manage it through scripted interactions and experience is of central concern to cognitive design. How else can we create effective behavior change, learning and innovation programs? At the very least we want designs that avoid wasting mental energy and in fact seek designs that maximize mental energy on both a biological and psychological basis.

I am interested to hear from readers about what you do to keep your mental batteries charge on a daily basis. What advice do you have for creating, maintaining or otherwise managing mental energy?

Source of Image: Futurity

A computer, some additional hardware and a bit of physics levitates a metal ball in 3D space. You are free to move the ball and the computer tracks the motion and keeps the ball stable. Likewise the computer can move the ball to execute a program or communicate with the user. This seemingly simple interface unlocks a wide range of interface possibilities. Many with strong implications for cognitive designers.  Check out the video.

Understanding and meeting deeply-felt psychological needs is the primary goal of cognitive design.   So I am always on the look out for studies that reveal how we think-and-feel in everyday situations in enough detail to have implications for designers.

Take for example, the recent research done at the University of Alberta on  Pleasure, pain and the satisfied customer. They studied emotional reactions to  service experiences and purchases and found significant difference between consumers that are primarily promotion-focused or pleasure seeking and those that are prevention-focused or pain avoiding. The bottom line:

Pleasure seekers have a stronger emotional reaction when things go well or bad while those that avoid pain have a more muted emotional response.

This has clear implications for experience and service designers looking to leverage emotional energy. Focus on pleasure seekers!

While over generalized, the researchers go on to suggestion that men and younger people tend to be pleasure seekers while women and older people tend to try and avoid pain.  They offer some practical advice for service recovery and word-of-mouth marketing:

“To some extent, they can tell front-line people that, as older people approach them, they’re going to be more prevention-focused, they’re not going to be as extreme either way,” said Murray. “But when something has gone really wrong with that 21-year-old’s game console, they’re going to be a lot more upset and more likely to tell their friends.

“On the flip side, when they take it home and it works well and they really enjoy it, they’re more excited and happy, and more likely to tell their friends about it.”

The pleasure-pain psychographic is strong enough to warrant a review of your product designs, service processes and even internal employee programs.