Classifying Design: Analytical vs. Emotional
November 20th, 2009
I’d like to preface this post by saying that I believe there is enough pretension in the design world, and I’m not trying to add to it. This is a frivolous exploration into the classification of design disciplines.
That said, focusing on my design responsibilities, and ignoring the fact that application development is also a large part of what I do, I have struggled to describe what it is I do for quite some time. This is a particularly troublesome task when speaking to those who are not familiar with industry terminology. On a fairly regular basis, I see people who have similar responsibilities using a mishmash of acronyms as a title — UX, IA, IxD. The terms these acronyms represent are all completely valid, and represent distinct skill sets. I have nothing against these terms, and yet, aside from being a mouthful, they do little to help people (who are not in our industry) understand what we do. On the other side of the equation, we have people who are commonly referred to as graphic designers.
I propose that there are really only two types of design when it comes to software/web application development — Analytical & Emotional. Now, I realize the term “Analytical Design” would present itself as an oxymoron to some, but let’s come back to that in a moment. In design, how something functions, and how something makes you feel can be considered separate, but very tightly coupled aspects. Continue Reading
