[IxDA Discuss] Scale of time perception

[Oleh Kovalchuke]

This illustrates another peculiar property of human mind. The idea has to
expressed in one simple chunk, not in three paragraphs. Otherwise the
qualifiers (second and third paragraph) will be ignored. On elementary level
an example would be shape perception: perception of either two faces or a
vase in Rubin's Vase. On more complex concept level this is known in
marketing as "own a word in the customer's mind" ("cola", "overnight" etc.).




I should have written this:



*We live in time. The goal of interaction design is design of time in user
defined meaningful way. User gives time meaning based on perceived length of
the time interval. The scale for time perception provides practical outline
of meaning of different time periods.*



Interaction designer has to be able to uncover and *incorporate those time
interval meanings, which users do not consciously articulate *(this is what
contextual interviews as well as formal education in philosophy and human
sciences (physiology, linguistics, anthropology, sociology...) are for) -
this important qualifying concept had to be written in a separate paragraph
and hence it will be lost initially and brought to everyone's attention
later on (just wait and see).



It follows then that *meaningless time fluff should be removed* by
interaction designer. *Time disruptions due to safety concerns are not
meaningless* hence should not be considered time fluff and should be
incorporated into design. It also follows then that to see and *to
incorporate meaning interaction designer has to be well versed in human
sciences* (and in philosophy).



I believe the above definition addresses slow design, Myst game experience,
social nature of humans as well as safety concerns.

--
Oleh Kovalchuke

>  To design time one needs to be aware of time properties. All times are
> approximate within one order of magnitude.
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------
> *Time* - Perception [*Example of interval perception*] - Possible
> underlying mechanism
> *---------------------------------------------------------------- *
>
> *0.1 second* - perception of causation ["*Is this button sticky or what?"]
> * - eye saccade, low level neuron pattern activation - this interval is
> important for nonchoppy animation
>
> *1 second* - perception of interval of taking turns in conversation ["*Go
> open that Window already, will you*?"] - ?
>
> *10 seconds* - attention span before it begins to drift from a single task
> ["*I like the colors. And the point is?"]* - low level pattern activation
> in neocortex - this particular interval is especially important in movie
> editing
>
> All time intervals listed above are important for design of perceived
> system response time (see GUI Bloopers).
> Attention span is important for interaction design of single layout.
> Recognition is somewhere in the above time scale.
>
> *1 min* - recall, formation of mental model???, just guesses here
>
> *10-30 min* - formation of flow experience: *["I think I see where you
> going", "Where was I?", "What time is it?", "Eureka!"*] - predictive
> pattern preactivation in higher layers of neocortex
>
> *1 day* - short memory storage, formation of long term memory: ["*Who
> wrote that message about design of time yesterday?"]* - interaction of
> hippocampus and neocortex
>
> *1 week* - learning simple skill ["*Gmail? What is it?"]:* Hebbian
> learning?
>
> *1 year* - learning complex skill ["*Unix command interface? No problem..*."]
> - formation of significantly new patterns and propagation of stable patterns
> into lower levels of neocortex, Hebbian learning?
>
> *10 years* - formation of values pattern ["*Who am I?" - a midlife crisis
> question*] - persistent neocortex patterns
>
> *Lifetime (100 years)* - individual memory [" *Who was that bully in the
> high school?"]* - persistent neocortex patterns
>
> *Thousands of years* - societal, cultural memory ["*Who is this God person
> anyway*?"] - storytelling
>
> *Millions of years* - DNA memory: ["*Whom will I sleep with tonight?" -
> perennial question of selfish gene*] - "lizard" brain
>
> --
> Oleh Kovalchuke
>