4 ways technology will (eventually) make us better designers

Over the past few years there has been a lot of buzz about how up-coming technology is going to revolutionise the world economy more powerfully than the internet. Automation is making swathes of jobs obsolete. Big data is allowing us to make decisions in ways we’ve never been able to before.

Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, Augmented Reality, Virtual Reality these are all terms which we continually hear but how will technology change the way we do UX design?

Here are the 4 ways I believe it is going to happen:

1. Physiological tracking

As designers it takes skill and experience to be able to perform an effective user test, contextual inquiry, interview or workshop. A common beginner mistake is to expect the user to tell us directly what we are looking for. More commonly, we must pay attention to and record subtlety and nuances such as an expression or tone of voice. Well what if as we interview people or as we observe them perform tasks, we could measure their heartbeat, eye movements, temperature, speed of movement and muscle tension? The technology is already available for this but in many companies designers are shy to utilise the tools, I predict that as the technology becomes cheaper, the interfaces will become even less technical and there will should be no user testing done without these tools.

2. Analysing hidden behavioural patterns using A.I

Given all the new user data points we can begin to track we will be able to (eventually) harness the capabilities of neural network algorithms to find significant behavioural patterns. For example we might discover that a certain heartbeat range, at a certain temperature, at a range of eyeball movement is the best combination that shows a user is going to take a desired action on the home page. In this hypothetical scenario the data scientists might give this a name such as ‘ES59’. Short for emotive state 59, having been the 59th combination in its class. Unfortunately, that name is not good enough so we designers will give it a new hypothetical name. We call it the ‘action state’. That action state becomes the end point of designing the homepage. There might be an ‘action state’ for every significant page. Or perhaps for every page.

3. The new generation of Interfaces: VR, AR & Robotics

UX design ,in a sense, is a result of applying decades old design thinking frameworks onto internet era interfaces; primarily webpages and later mobile apps. Whether we still call it UX design or something else, the trend will continue. Design thinking will be applied but the interfaces will change. Augmented reality looks to be the front runner in terms of up-coming scale. Apple has said that in 2020 the iPhone will have AR camera technology. It won’t happen overnight but it will happen.

4. Increasing computer speeds + increased personalised data = personalised UX design

When i say ‘personalised’ UX design here, I mean ‘personalised’ the same way Spotify ‘personalises’ your smart playlist. It makes a calculated guess as to what you like based on what you’ve listened to and continues to get better the more data it gets (from the actions you take). The same will happen for interfaces. Think about how a website builder, such as WIX or Squarespace, gives you design options to choose from, what if this was automated by an algorithm that was specialised in understanding what kind of design you like? Or more accurately, based on data your market likes? Why would you not design accordingly? After all, it’s been tracking it for years.

Best,

Mark