Disciplines in HCI (1)
(See Johnson, 1992)

Ergonomics/Human Factors

(USA) Human Factors: matching physical machine design to humans

(UK) Ergonomists: additionally:

Information presentation
Language design
Training...

 

Psychology

Concerned with describing, modeling, predicting and explaining human behavior

Many different focuses on human behavior:

Biological,
Cognitive,
Emotion,
Motivation,
Social,
Organizational

A variety of means by which it is investigated:

Observation,
Laboratory experiments,
Case studies,
Simulation

 

Computer science

Theory, method and practice of 'computing'.

Main concerns:

Construction and programming of computers
Programming language design
Architectural/algorithmic design of programs

Contribution to interface design:

Design methods and techniques that incorporate UID

 

Engineering for Users

Description and understanding of users and their tasks:

How well does the system design match user tasks?

Steps:

Identification of users
Identification of tasks
Experiments and prototyping to determine design
Specification and verification of design

Generalization and approximation:

Plurality of tasks

Theories must be robust and flexible enough to support wide range of users

Collectively, each discipline contributes it's knowledge, theories and working practice toward the design of effective and efficient human-computer interfaces.