Designing for Flow (Kshitiz Anand)

Flow, a mental state, first proposed by psychology professor Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi; is characterized by a distorted sense of time, a lack of self-consciousness, and complete engagement in the task at hand. Often measured as a function of the emotional outcome, Flow is a useful tool to understand User Experience.

Transcript

1. Kshitiz Anand,
   UXINDIA13 Conference Presentation
   

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2. DESIGN FOR
   FLOW
   @kshitiz #uxindia13
   Talk delivered at UX India Conference,
   October 25th, 2013
   

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3. Currently I head :
   INDIA STUDIO!
   Otherwise I have a few startup initiatives
   

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5. Origin of this term?
   

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7. Marcus Arelius in his writings 'the Meditations’, wrote a lot about the
   flow of thoughts and happiness and he concluded that "most things
   flow naturally" and in his opinion it was better to "Go with the Flow"
   than to try and change society.
   
   

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8. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
   
   Hungarian, Professor of psychology
   
   Today we are going to speak about
   

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9. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
   How do you say his name?
   

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10. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
    Me-high Chick-sent-me-high
    

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11. FLOW
    The psychology
    of optimal
    experience
    

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12. FLOW
    The psychology
    of optimal
    experience
    His most famous work
    Was done to study happiness in people
    

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13. People who learn to control inner experience will be able
    to determine the quality of their lives, which is as close as
    any of us can come to being happy.
    
    - M Csikszentmihalyi, Flow, 1990
    
    

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14. Good UX à Happy people
    

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15. Design for people, emotions, behaviors.
    Do not design for technology
    

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16. But its easier said than done…
    So let us go a bit deeper into understanding this
    

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17. What actually goes on in the human mind,
    when we are looking at designing for happiness
    

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18. Going from this
    

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19. To this
    

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20. Look into
    a cognitive, psychological
    &
    behavioral understanding
    of what builds a good UX  
    

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21. Our mental and emotional states
    M Csikszentmihalyi, Finding Flow, 1997
    

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22. These states are controlled by
    CONSCIOUSNESS
    

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23. These states are controlled by
    CONSCIOUSNESS
    What is CONSCIOUSNESS ?
    

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24. CONSCIOUSNESS is a
    Phenomenological construct
    

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25. It is dependent on phenomena :
    Subjective experiences of the individual
    

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26. Order in the Consciousness à GOOD UX
    Disorder in the Consciousness à BAD UX
    

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27. MASTERY OVER CONSCIOUSNESS à HAPPINESS
    Mastery of the Consciousness à Happiness
    

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28. More than anything else, men and women seek happiness
    
    - Socrates, 2300 years ago
    
    

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29. Optimal experience
    depends upon ability
    to control what
    happens in the
    consciousness each
    moment
    

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30. How does Consciousness work?
    How is it controlled?
    

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31. CONSCIOUSNESS :
    Where pain and pleasure both reside
    

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32. Users actions are based on INSTINCT :
    What we feel is right, the inner voice
    

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33. Information theory helps
    in understanding what
    really happens in the
    consciousness
    

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34. What interests us, is how
    sensory data (what we
    experience through our
    senses) are collected
    processed, stored and
    used
    

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35. Consciousness is a place for ordered
    information à Responds to subjectively
    experienced reality
    

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36. The consciousness processes
    INFORMATION BITS
    

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37. COGNITIVE LOAD : Too much information
    to process à Leads to CHAOS
    

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38. CHAOS creates DISCONTENT: facilitated
    by chronic dissatisfaction and anxiety
    

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39. OVERCOMING the anxiety :
    RECLAIMING the experience
    

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40. But not everything we are presented with, is
    processed by the Consciousness
    

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41. The processing of information by the
    Consciousness is INTENTION
    

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42. Our INTENTIONs decide the ATTENTION
    spans and time we give to a task
    

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43. But there are limits of Consciousness :
    How much information bits can the human
    mind (central nervous system) process ?
    

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44. Shortest time it takes to
    discriminate between one
    set of information bit and
    other is about 1/18th of a
    second
    

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45. One can process upto 126
    bits of information per
    second
    = 7560 bits per minute
    = Almost half a million per hour
    = 185 billion bits of information in a
    lifetime *
    * Assumption: Lifespan = 70years, and 16 hours or active waking time each days
    
    

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46. 185 billion bits of information in a
    lifetime !!!!
    Seems a lot, but it is not!
    To understand what the other person
    is saying, 40 bits of information are
    processed each second.
    

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47. Information is processed by the consciousness
    because we give it ATTENTION
    

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48. ATTENTION is Psychic energy, that decides
    what information bits need to be processed and
    tells the consciousness what to do
    

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49. The more you complicate the information,
    the more difficulty the consciousness has in
    processing it!
    

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50. COMPLEXITY is a result of
    differentiation and Integration
    in Information.
    Differentiation à
    Move towards uniqueness
    Integration à
    Union of old vs new, other ideas,
    preconceived impressions
    

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51. COMPLEXITY à Disorder in Consciousness
    We call it PSYCHIC ENTROPY
    

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52. Removing Psychic Entropy in Consciousness,
    is optimal experience and it leads to FLOW
    

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53. DESIGNING FOR FLOW = BETTER UX
    

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54. HOW ?
    

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56. Takeaway #1
    Think about the Consciousness
    when you design
    

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57. Takeaway #2
    The goal is mastery of this
    consciousness through design
    decisions
    

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58. Takeaway #3
    How can you control the users
    intentions? Design for it.
    

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59. Takeaway #4
    Think on how much attention
    should be given to each task?
    

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60. Takeaway #5
    Think about Information Bits that
    the consciousness is processing
    

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61. Takeaway #6
    Reduce cognitive load to remove
    Chaos in consciousness
    

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62. Takeaway #7
    Avoid Complexity and reduce
    Psychic entropy
    

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63. Takeaway #8
    Overcome anxiety of the customer!
    

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64. Takeaway #9
    Help them reclaim the experience
    

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65. Takeaway #10
    Spread Happiness J
    

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66. THANK YOU!
    Go with the flow!
    Connect with me on
    

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