This sounds so much like the Nature vs. Nurture debate <which ended in a tie, BTW, if it ended at all> that one might as well state it up front to stave off a lot of discharged steam. Practically every discipline centered around people (psychology, sociology, economics, anthropology, medicine, etc.) has engaged (and will continue to engage) in this debate, explicitly or implicitly. Consider the decline of Skinnerian behaviorism after Chomsky's work on linguistics. Despite the bad rap that Behaviorism has got, numerous organizations and institutions (the military, for instance) apply it successfully. So let's just say that there are many universal principles of design and a significant fraction of these are a consequence of common biological and physical constraints. And further, to the extent that there are common determinants of culture, there are additional principles of design that could be considered kinda-sorta universal. And then there are probably some idiosyncratic cultural issues for which no 'universal principles' will work (at all times). But then this has always been the case in every realm of human endeavor since time immemorial. The variable plasticity of the human mind (across age groups, cultures, contexts, etc.) in its ability to adapt to circumstances will render this discussion quite fruitless.
On the other hand, there's nothing so fun as a good fight! Fruitlessness apart, it's likely to bring out some interesting issues. -murli On 12/27/07, Dan Saffer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > > This begs the question: are there universal principles of > (interaction) design that apply regardless of the context or user > base? Are there standards that apply equally to CEOs in London and > impoverished children in sub-Saharan Africa? > > My guess is: yes, there are some. Fitts' Law, Hick's Law, Tesler's > Law, the Poka-Yoke Principle, and probably a few others are fixed. > > What these are would be an interesting list. > > Dan > > ________________________________________________________________ *Come to IxDA Interaction08 | Savannah* February 8-10, 2008 in Savannah, GA, USA Register today: http://interaction08.ixda.org/ ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://www.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://www.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://www.ixda.org/help
