A mathematical ratio, approximately 1.618:1, often used in design and art to create aesthetically pleasing compositions. Important for designing visually balanced and appealing layouts, leveraging natural aesthetics to enhance user experience.
The body of practical guidance to color mixing and the visual effects of specific color combinations. Crucial for understanding color relationships and creating effective visual designs.
A structured set of breakpoints used to create responsive designs that work seamlessly across multiple devices. Important for maintaining consistency and usability in responsive design.
A type of usability testing conducted at the end of the design process to evaluate the effectiveness and overall user experience. Important for assessing the final design's usability and identifying any remaining issues.
A structured framework for product design that stands for Comprehend the situation, Identify the customer, Report customer needs, Cut through prioritization, List solutions, Evaluate trade-offs, and Summarize recommendations. Essential for guiding product managers through a comprehensive design process.
The degree to which a system's components may be separated and recombined, often used in the context of software or hardware design. Important for enhancing flexibility, reusability, and ease of maintenance in design.
A principle stating that users spend most of their time on other websites and prefer your site to work the same way as all the other sites they already know. Crucial for designing user-friendly and familiar interfaces.
A dark pattern where it's easy to get into a situation but hard to get out of it, such as signing up for a service but finding it difficult to cancel. Awareness of this tactic is crucial to design fair user experiences with straightforward entry and exit points.
The attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities, often used in design to make interfaces more relatable and engaging. Important for creating relatable and engaging designs that resonate with users.
The study of structures of consciousness as experienced from the first-person point of view. Important for designing user experiences that are intuitive and empathetic.
A principle stating that as the flexibility of a system increases, its usability often decreases, and vice versa. Crucial for balancing versatility and ease of use in design.
The degree to which a product's elements are consistent with each other. Crucial for creating a cohesive and intuitive user experience.
The study of the nature of beauty, art, and taste and the creation and appreciation of beauty. Essential for creating visually appealing and engaging user interfaces.
Principle of Least Astonishment (POLA) is a design guideline stating that interfaces should behave in a way that users expect to avoid confusion. Crucial for enhancing user experience and reducing the learning curve in digital products.
The use of icons or graphical symbols to represent objects, actions, or concepts, enhancing usability and visual communication. Crucial for creating intuitive and accessible user interfaces.
A design technique that involves showing only essential information initially, revealing additional details as needed to prevent information overload. Crucial for creating user-friendly interfaces that enhance usability and reduce cognitive load.
Interfaces that use multiple forms of interaction, such as visual, auditory, and tactile, to enhance user experience and accessibility. Essential for creating accessible and engaging user experiences across different sensory modalities.
The high-level structure of a software application, defining its components and their interactions. Essential for designing robust, scalable, and maintainable digital products.
The ability to recognize, understand, and manage one's own emotions and the emotions of others. Essential for designing empathetic user experiences and effective team collaboration.
The practice of guiding and inspiring teams to create effective, user-centered design solutions that align with business goals. Crucial for fostering a culture of innovation, collaboration, and excellence in design practices within organizations.
An approach to design that aligns design activities with strategic business goals, ensuring that design contributes to overall organizational success. Essential for integrating design into the strategic planning process and achieving business objectives.
A system of design variables used to maintain consistency in a design system, such as colors, fonts, and spacing. Crucial for ensuring uniformity and scalability in design across different platforms and products.
An approach to design that explores and creates provocative scenarios of future possibilities to stimulate discussion and critical thinking about the direction of design and society. Important for pushing the boundaries of conventional design thinking and envisioning future implications.
An approach to design where content is prioritized and designed before other elements like layout and visual design. Crucial for ensuring that the design supports and enhances the content.
Emerging patterns and movements in design that gain popularity and influence on a global scale. Important for staying current with industry standards and innovating design practices.
An approach to design that relies on data and analytics to inform decisions and measure success. Crucial for making informed design decisions that are backed by evidence.
A cohesive system of visual and interaction design principles and guidelines that ensure consistency and coherence across a product or brand's interfaces and experiences. Essential for creating a unified and recognizable user experience, ensuring consistency, usability, and brand identity across all platforms and touchpoints.
Short, exploratory design activities or exercises that encourage creative thinking and experimentation. Important for fostering creativity and innovation in the design process.
A comprehensive review of a brand's design assets and practices to ensure consistency and effectiveness. Important for maintaining a cohesive and effective brand identity.
A professional responsible for the creation and development of products, ensuring they meet user needs and are visually appealing and functional. Important for translating user needs and business goals into tangible product solutions.
The process of creating and developing new products, focusing on form, function, usability, and aesthetics to meet user needs. Crucial for developing products that are both functional and appealing to users.
An iterative design process that focuses on the users and their needs at every phase of the design process. Crucial for creating products that are effective, efficient, and satisfying for the end users.
A time-constrained, intensive process that helps teams quickly design, prototype, and test ideas. Important for rapidly developing and validating design solutions.
An experimental design where different groups of participants are exposed to different conditions, allowing for comparison between groups. Important for understanding and applying different experimental designs in user research.
The practice of designing products that evoke specific emotional responses to enhance user experience and engagement. Crucial for creating deeply engaging and satisfying user experiences.
A design philosophy that considers the diverse needs and abilities of all users, aiming to create products that are accessible to everyone. Crucial for ensuring that products are usable and accessible by the widest possible audience.
The practice of designing applications specifically for a particular operating system or platform, leveraging its unique features and capabilities. Important for delivering high-performance and responsive user experiences.
Designing products that leverage behavioral science to influence user behavior in positive ways. Crucial for creating products that are effective in shaping user behavior and improving engagement.
A design approach that uses data, algorithms, and predictive analytics to anticipate user needs and behaviors, creating more personalized and effective experiences. Crucial for enhancing user experience through anticipation and personalization.
A framework that incorporates privacy considerations into the design and development of products and services from the outset. Crucial for ensuring user privacy and compliance with data protection regulations.
The practice of presenting information in a way that is clear, accessible, and useful to the user. Essential for creating effective and user-friendly interfaces and communications.
A research design where the same participants are used in all conditions of an experiment, allowing for the comparison of different conditions within the same group. Essential for reducing variability and improving the reliability of experimental results.
The perceived heaviness or importance of an element in a design, influenced by factors such as size, color, and contrast. Crucial for creating balanced and visually appealing designs.
Responsive Web Design (RWD) is an approach to web design that makes web pages render well on a variety of devices and window or screen sizes. Essential for creating flexible, adaptive web experiences that maintain functionality and aesthetics across different platforms and devices.
A design philosophy that views constraints as opportunities for creativity and innovation, rather than limitations. Crucial for fostering a mindset that turns limitations into design strengths.
A prompt or cue that initiates a behavior or response, often used in behavior design to encourage specific actions. Crucial for designing systems that effectively prompt desired user behaviors.
A model by Don Norman outlining the cognitive steps users take when interacting with a system: goal formation, planning, specifying, performing, perceiving, interpreting, and comparing. Important for designing user-friendly and effective products by understanding and supporting user behavior at each stage.
The phenomenon where users perceive aesthetically pleasing designs as more usable, regardless of the actual usability. Important for designers to understand the impact of aesthetics on user perception and usability.
A Gestalt principle stating that elements with a distinct visual feature (e.g., a unique color, size, or shape) capture attention and are perceived as a focal point. Crucial for designing interfaces that direct attention toward visual elements that signal and enable forward progress.
A Gestalt principle stating that elements that are visually connected are perceived as more related than elements with no connection. Essential for creating designs that effectively group related elements.
A dark pattern where the design focuses the user's attention on one thing to distract them from another. Designers should avoid this deceptive tactic and ensure user attention is not unfairly diverted.
The consistent spacing of text and elements in a design to create a harmonious and readable layout. Crucial for improving readability and visual appeal in design.
A dark pattern where the user interface is manipulated in a way that prioritizes certain actions over others to benefit the company. It's crucial to avoid this tactic and design fair interfaces without manipulating user actions.
A technique used to assess the visual hierarchy of a design by squinting to see which elements stand out the most. Essential for evaluating the effectiveness of a design's layout and emphasis.
An approach that places the user's needs, preferences, and behaviors at the forefront of all design and development activities. Important for fostering a design culture that prioritizes user satisfaction and engagement.
The principle stating that there is a limit to the amount of complexity that users can handle, and if designers don't manage complexity, users will. Crucial for designing user-friendly systems that manage complexity effectively.
Elements of a service or product that are not visible to the user but are essential for delivering the front-stage experience. Crucial for understanding and designing the full user experience, including behind-the-scenes elements.
A type of usability testing conducted during the design process to identify issues and improve the design iteratively. Crucial for refining designs and ensuring usability before final release.
The study of how the brain perceives and responds to art and design, exploring the neural basis for aesthetic experiences. Important for understanding the neurological underpinnings of aesthetic preferences and enhancing design impact.
A dark pattern where the user is required to do something in order to access certain functionality or information. Designers must avoid compulsory actions and provide optional choices to respect user autonomy.