Designing for Humans, Not Robots (or Vulcans)

Abstract

There is growing interest in embodiment in information seeking, which we use as an opportunity to reconsider what we as designers of information interfaces aim for. While we have become quite good at developing interfaces that are effective at supporting specific needs or needs that have been rendered specific, we are still not good at providing interfaces that reflect a key human characteristic and strength: being embedded in this world and being curious about it. While this discussion is related to research into serendipity (see, e.g., sensory information This is a point we will return to when discussing Clark's (1998) scaffolding-minds perspective.