Interaction design

Q: What's the difference between interaction design and UX design?

Interaction design is one of the specialisms drawn on in UX design projects. In digital projects, it is a significant part of the design work.

Q: What is feedback in interaction design?

In interaction design, feedback is an important component. It corresponds to any form of response that the interface provides to the user following one of their actions. Feedback can take different forms: visual, audible, haptic, or even a mix of all of these.

Q: What are the dimensions of interaction design?

The thing to remember is that interaction design goes beyond the visual aspect alone. Gillian Crampton Smith proposed four dimensions, completed by a fifth added by Kevin Silver. The five are words (texts, labels), visual representations (icons, images), physical space (usage context, hardware), time (duration of animations, pace of transitions) and behaviour (actions and reactions of the interface).

Concept

How the interface responds to the user

Interaction design defines how an interface reacts to the user's actions. This notion of interaction covers, in particular, the state changes of components and the system's feedback (error message, loading screen…). Interaction design is the behavioural logic of the product, at the crossroads between information architecture and the visual interface.

What is interaction design for?

planning the full set of an interface's states (empty, loading, error, success) consistently
defining interaction behaviours to support the user experience
making sure every user action gets a clear, immediate response, in line with Nielsen's heuristic “Visibility of System Feedback”

Why practise interaction design?

documenting the expected behaviours of the interface with the development teams
improving the user experience without touching the visual interface

Words

you could call it UX writing, since for good interaction design the text has to match the action.

The visual

whether it's an image or a pictogram, the visual representation of an element can help make the expected interaction understood. Take the example of the magnifying-glass symbol for search (in the West).

Physical hardware

this means the phone, the tablet, the computer, but also the mouse, the keyboard, and so on. You have to design while keeping in mind the hardware that will carry the interfaces. For example, there is no hover effect on mobile devices to signal clickable zones; you therefore have to find a way to make elements understood as clickable without that effect.

Time

the interface must be responsive, in real time with the user's actions. Animations that are too long can be counter-productive for the user. Progress bars, for example, help convey a loading time while reducing the user's frustration.

Behaviour

following a user action, the interface must react accordingly and appropriately. These elements reassure the user during their interactions (success message, responsive swipe, and so on)

Interaction design covers states, the interface elements that appear the moment the user interacts with the product. These interactions provide useful information to the user. Micro-animation is very often associated with interaction design. However, micro-animation serves rather to make this interaction design more impactful while improving the perceived experience. It is merely a “cosmetic” addition on top of interaction design.

What's the difference between interaction design and UX design?

What is feedback in interaction design?

What are the dimensions of interaction design?

An English-learning platform built like a video game, mini-bosses included

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The M-ticket, from purchase journey to the TBM app

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Related methods

Interface design

UI design shapes the visual layer of a product: layout, colours, typography, components. It turns the experience into tangible elements.

Experience design

Experience design (UX design) shapes what the user encounters beyond the interface: journeys, emotions, contexts.

Human-computer interaction

HCI (human-computer interaction) refers to the means of interaction between a human and a computer system.

Affordance

Affordance is the ability of an interface element to suggest its use. Donald Norman popularised the concept: only perceived affordance counts.

Cognitive ergonomics

Cognitive ergonomics turns the way the brain works into design principles. Perception, memory, mental load: the foundations of UX design.

Mental model

A mental model is the representation a user builds of a system. Designing in line with those models reduces errors and friction in use.

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