Human Factors Engineers and Ergonomists would argue that ‘User Experience’ is relatively a new term and definitely a buzzword. It is an attempt to re-package the old technique with a new age gimmick. The academic community has been engaged with this issue for some time now. Some interesting discussions in this context has been posted by Baekdal or Don Norman.

Traditional usability treats users mainly as task doers in a specific contexts. The emphasis remains on the performance and their quantitative attribution to measure success and utility of a design. ‘Ergonomics’ with all its good intentions, ends up overshadowing ‘empathy’ and ‘desire’ which are human qualities of a user. This aspect becomes even more prominent when the ‘instrumental approach’ of traditional usability does not account for the ‘feeling, thinking and Acting’ of the user or recognize them as self-motivated ‘Social’ individuals. Users are not merely information processors, they are humans with social contexts, political motives and emotional pangs.

User Experience on the other hand is a consequence of a user’s internal state (predispositions, expectations, needs, motivation, mood, etc.), the characteristics of the designed system (e.g. complexity, purpose, usability, functionality, etc.) and the context (or the environment) within which the interaction occurs (e.g. organizational/social setting, meaningfulness of the activity, voluntariness of use, etc.).
– Hassenzahl & Tractinsky, Darmstadt University of Technology, Germany & Ben-Gurion University, Israel. See the full article

Let us look at an example to illustrates this. In the usability study of an arcade game, the emphasis is more on the availability of critical information like position, points, level etc. to the gamer than on the unpredictability of a sudden situation that may arise in the event of loss of resources or entering new levels. ‘Elements of surprise’ or ‘discoverability’ is not accommodated in the clinical attempt to engineer an user friendly game system. But may be there are exceptions. In the larger context of HCI and Human Factors Engineering, some thoughts have been given towards the ‘Mechanics of Collaboration’ and the ‘Cognitive Patterns of preferences and motivation’ for game playing and competitiveness. Please find the article by Lucy A. Joyner and Jim TerKeurst.
Yet, what is truly lacking is the practice level guidelines to collect user data and synthesize them into an emotionally responsive design. Don Norman’s ‘Emotional Design’ [See reference] structures the human information processing in three levels, such as visceral, behavioral and reflective, attempting to create a hierarchy of ‘neural response systems’ in the order of immediacy (neurophysiological to socio-cultural). The obvious question here is that ‘how does the system designer specifically designs for each of these levels separately. Dan Norman himself says ‘it is not possible to design for all three levels at once’. Again, the study of human experiences, either Hedonistic or Negative, indicate the involvement of all three levels at the same time in invoking various shades of emotion and experiences in humans.
The discussion on the ‘experience’ does not remain restricted to just the aesthetic richness or emotional appeal of the product or interfaces or the marvels of rich applications. Towards a more comprehensive definition of ‘Experience’, it is more like a catharsis that affect the user after being able to achieve more than her immediate goals through technology mediated interactions and begins an emotional relationship with the artifact directly or indirectly. An example scenario would be: John is browsing a new township on Google Maps for a very high level goal of ‘finding a suitable house for purchase’. While browsing, John goes to ‘find businesses’ tab and searches with the keyword ‘Realtors’. And in one instant all the relevant results were plotted on the same map view along with additional information such as ‘packers & movers’, ‘property registrars’ and even ‘feedback’ from someone who had already purchased a property in same area etc. Now John is immediately into business! Does that ’surprise’ element enhance the overall ‘experience’ of Google Maps as an application. You Bet!

And for all those who are concerned about the ‘Business’ or ‘Social’ ROI or cost-justifying usability, remember ‘Happy Customers mostly buy or take time to learn!’.

References:

• Hanna Stelmaszewska, Bob Fields, Ann Blandford (Middlesex University & University College London, UK). Emotion and technology: an empirical study
• Christian Peter (Fraunhofer IGD Rostock, Germany). Emotion Models and their Implications for System Design
• Paul Aumer Ryan (School of Information, University of Texas). Emotional Design