How much customization is enough in UX? A case study
Mind traps for UX designers
Freedom is one of the very few notions that are such as essential values of the Western culture that we hardly ever question them. Generally speaking, we declare to value it most and we don’t want to our freedom to be reduced. The topic is well explored by both modern social studies, greatest minds of the contemporary, disco music and even the way we speak every day to each other.
Yet, when it comes to interface design and intuitive UX, one can question if no limits for users are exactly what they need (regardless of the fact they declare that).
Are limitless options best for users?
Although we tend to agree that freedom is the highest value, more often than not we do not deal with absolute freedom when it comes to user interfaces.
Of course, the idea of open web and open software was the intellectual background for the development of the products we use everyday. But we cannot forget that conversation was between the brightest and most adventurous minds of the seventies, the pioneers of what we now call IT, who were not only extremely technically experienced comparing to the rest of the society, but also quite often very educated.
Computer interfaces were quite impossible for use for any mainstream users prior to the revolutionary conflict between Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. Wozniak, who is the hardware father of Apple and the designer of Apple I and Apple II, was from the beginning keen on the idea of openness of computer products. That was not what Jobs could sign himself below as a fan of quite contrary approach.
Quality over freedom
One of the pillars of Jobs philosophy was to deliver the best quality to the actual users of the Apple products. Although it does not sound revolutionary at all, when it comes to the executive level — it was back then. Jobs was a supporter of a very unpopular idea of actually closing both hardware and software, so the end users cannot customize and modify the computer product that they get in Apple stores.
While reading Jobs biography by Walter Issacson it struck me (as I did not pay attention to this topic mush prior to the readning) that even now this idea meets with great controversy among the IT intellectuals.
Bas van Abel’s manifesto meets with an applause of the society. The founder of Fairphone — an ethical response to a smartphone — claims that if you cannot open something, you do not own it.
Yet, the idea of customizing computer and mobile products still remains and probably will remain a very elite concept as it is not necessarily aligned with the way we generally deal with information processing as human beings.
I believe that the concept of closed software is often misinterpreted as a representation of the feeling of superiority over the end users out of not enough knowledge of how the mind works.
Jobs and Mike Markkula, one of the very first investors of Apple, could not be further from that.
Markkula wrote his principles in a one-page paper titled “The Apple Marketing Philosophy” that stressed three points. The first was empathy, an intimate connection with the feelings of the customer: “We will truly understand their needs better than any other company.” (read whole story here)
And what did Markkula and Jobs actually understood about the way we interact with computer products? The presence of the phenomenon that is called cognitive overload.
What is cognitive overload
Without diving deep into cognitive psychology, this term relates to the total amount of mental effort that is required to complete a task involving processing of information. This term was introduced to psychology in the 70’s by John Sweller, emeritus professor of UNSW Sydney, in his Ph.D. paper “Effects of initial discrimination training on subsequent shift learning in animals and humans”.
He developed the theory of cognitive load in his further papers such as “Cognitive Load Theory and the Format of Instruction”.
According to Sweller, cognitive overload can be:
1. Intrinsic — The inherent difficulty of the concept.
2. Extraneous — The complexity added by the way the concept is presented.
3. Germane — The construction of patterns, models and associations.
His ideas did not last overlooked by information specialists for long since this theory has extremely practical application in the realm of interface design.
Steve Krug in his famous book “Don’t make me think” describes how human beings tend to reduce the number of information that they have to process in order to complete tasks efficiently. Design can be of a great help when people interact with complex tasks, yet it can also damage the experience by adding even more complexity and hesitation to the cognitive situation that is complex anyway.
How many times did you have problems buying a ticket online or making a financial operation on the website of your bank from the pure reason that you did not know what to click?
Numerous modern studies prove that expecting users to process more information that they feel comfortable with (=the amount of information that is absolutely necessary to complete a task) not only leads to growing frustration, but also significantly harms conversion.
Yet, from the cultural reasons I described in the first paragraphs, the fashion of personalizing and customizing everything that is out there in the interface design. I call it “fashion” deliberately, because when there is no practical explaination for solutions to exist, they should be called this way.
In my opinion, overcustiomized and overpersonalized interfaces are not what users actually want to interact with. They are also not good for the comfortable way of interacting with digital products.
Yet, it is a strong trend that may stem from the pure fact that we, the interface designers, work with clients who share beliefs with most of the population that is not educated in cognitive psychology. That belief that I am talking about is the idea that the values of our society work according to the same rules as the way our mind functions.
When customization is a complete overkill. A case study
How much of personalization is enough and how much is an overkill? I did not need to look too far for a good example. The lack of balance between the idea that people want to feel special and unique and their need for the digital products to work intuitively and fast a possible ruins my coffee everyday.
What bad interface design has to do with very mediocre coffee? More than you would expect.
In my office, we have Nivona Caferomantica coffee machine. It is a popular office model that allows every user to modify and save his very own special program for making coffee.
On the superficial level, it sounds super cool. But the taste of reality is quite different.
After selecting a program from main menu (cappucino, espresso, latte and so on) a user can modify how much coffee he or she wants the machine to grind by turning a knob. He or she can also modify how much the volume of coffee and the volume of milk.
Still, does not sound bad. But the tricky problem is that the machine does not reset the special settings for the coffee that is just being made. It overwrites them. If two people use it at their house and one always drinks cappucino and the other drinks espresso — no problem. It is even kind of handy.
But imagine what happened after 40 people started to manipulate with the custom settings. You are right — an absolute chaos.
Do users want to correct the settings of the last person that used the machine every time they want to have a cup of coffee? No. Do the personalization make the coffee sound better? Quite contrary, because none of us is a trained barista. We are regular office people who want to have a coffee that tastes good. So why are we expected by the device to actually know the recipes for coffee (how many grains to grind, how much hot water to add and how much of steamed milk pour on top)?
The greatest problem with customization
The biggest popular side effect of implementing customization as a mindless trend everywhere where possible is the shift of expertise. When facing customization, the expertise that we are not in possesion of is unexpectedly on our side. We create machines to replace proffesionals, but surprisingly this replacement does not take place. Coffee machine with highly-developed customization options does not replace a trained barista, but shifts on you the responsibility and the need for expertise. It may sound quite funny, but they do not save time. They are even more time consuming, because we need to gain knowledge that we did not need to posses before.
It does not only apply to coffee makers, but also overpersonalized washing machines, sound gear and, well, e-commerce and professional software to huge extend or even to McDonald’s new digital kiosks.
Of course, there are It is not my job to state where lies the border between enough personalization and too much, because there are cases when people need it. It is great that left-handed designers can set up their own Sketch shortcuts that are more left-hand friendly. It is also clever and useful that you can order shoes at New Balance in wide, standard and narrow version.
Yet a widespread use of it can be just a fashion that actually irritates people without adding anything extra in return.
