PACT:

A Framework for Designing Interactive Systems

Fall 22-23

Dr. Heba Ismail

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Class Activity
• Choose a system from the slides or of your own
choice and analyze all the PACT elements along all
the dimensions discussed in the class.
• Make sure to give a thorough and very focused
analysis
• Keep in mind to select a specific a activity in the
system that you choose and analyze the relevant
attributes that has impact on the user experience.

• Jamboard Link:
https://jamboard.google.com/d/1lHJrXU3NW2fk6gqif
m4kPmoRFerShMs2D4uKdfmROI4/edit?usp=sharing

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Lecture Learning Outcomes
• Understand the main building blocks of any interactive
system.
• Putting things together into the PACT framework.
• Understand each component of PACT:
– People
– Activities
– Context
– Technology
• Appreciate the diversity in these components and the need
for well-define design processes and tasks that would allow
for successful design and implementation of interactive
systems.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Overview
An essential part of our approach to designing interactive systems is that
it should put people first; it should be human-centred.

We use the acronym PACT (People, Activities, Contexts, Technologies) as

a useful framework for thinking about a design situation.

Designers need to understand the people who will use their systems and
products.

They need to understand the activities that people want to undertake

and the contexts in which those activities take place.

Designers also need to know about the features of interactive

technologies and how to approach designing interactive systems.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 PACT
• People use technologies to undertake activities in
contexts.

• Examples…

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Kids playing video games

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 A manger typing an email

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 A woman making a payment using her mobile phone

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 PACT – more examples
• People use technologies to undertake activities in
contexts.

• For example, teenagers use mobile (cell) phones to send text

messages to their friends whilst sitting on a bus.
•
• Secretaries use Microsoft Word to write documents in a firm
of solicitors.

• Air traffic controllers work together to ensure the smooth

operation of an airport.

• People use MySpace to make contact with other people

when sitting in an Internet café.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Activities and Technologies
• In all these settings we see people using technologies
to undertake activities in contexts and it is the
variety of each of these elements that makes
designing interactive systems such a difficult and
fascinating challenge.

• Technologies are there to support a wide range of

people undertaking various activities in different
contexts.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Technology Changes Over Time

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Technology and Activities
• Technology has
limitations.

• Also, technology
evolves!

• If the technology
changes then the
nature of the activities
will also change.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 The Cycle continues
• Activities (and the contexts within which
they take place) establish requirements
for technologies that in turn offer
opportunities that change the nature of
activities.

• And so the cycle continues as the changed

activity results in new requirements for
technologies and so on.

• Designers need to keep this cycle in mind

as they attempt to understand and design
for some domain. (The word ‘domain’
here means an area of study, a ‘sphere of
activity’.)

• For example, as personal computers have

become more common, the domain of e-
mail has changed. Originally e-mail was all
in text only, but now it is in full colour with
pictures and video embedded. Other
items can be attached to e-mails easily.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 People
• People differ from one another in a variety
of ways.

– Physical differences

– Psychological differences

– Social Differences

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Physical differences
• People differ in physical characteristics such as height and weight.

• Variability in the five senses – sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste – has
a huge effect on how accessible, how usable and how enjoyable using a
technology will be for people in different contexts.

• For example, colour blindness (usually the inability to correctly distinguish

between red and green colours) affects about 8 percent of western males, short-
sightedness and long-sightedness affect many, and many people are hearing
impaired.
• People with impairment.

• In Europe there are 2.8 million wheelchair users so designers must consider where
technologies are placed, and many people have dexterity impairments involving
the use of their fingers.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Example

• People have different finger

sizes.
• We all have relatively larger
figure sizes than mobile qwerty
keyboards.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Ergonomics –history
• The term ‘ergonomics’ was coined in 1948 to describe the study of the relationships between people and
their environment.

• At that time technically advanced weapons systems were being rapidly developed which required that their
design matched human and environmental factors if they were to be used effectively and, paradoxically,
safely.

• The environment includes the ambient environment (temperature, humidity, atmospheric pressure, light
levels, noise and so on) and the working environment too (the design of machines, health and safety issues
– e.g. hygiene, toxicology, exposure to ionizing radiation, microwaves, etc.).

• Ergonomics is multi-disciplinary, drawing on anatomy and physiology, various aspects of psychology (e.g.
physiological and experimental), physics, engineering and work studies among others.

• In everyday life we come across the application of ergonomic design principles in every well-designed
interactive system.

• In the Mercedes-Benz sales literature for its new coupé we find the following ergonomic description:
• ‘Once inside the C-Class Sports Coupé you’ll find a wealth of ergonomic detail, designed to live up to the promise of its looks.
As if cast from a single mould, the dashboard curves are smooth to the touch ’

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Ergonomic design
• While ergonomics has a longer history than HCI, it would be a mistake to perceive
it as being old and out of touch – quite the reverse.

• Ergonomics has much to tell us about the design of interactive devices such as a
mobile games console and a PDA (personal digital assistant).

• Such devices are faced with ergonomic design challenges.

• For example, we all have relatively fat fingers compared with how small buttons
can be made.

• In the world of mobile computing, small is good but too small is bad.

• Ergonomics can put numbers on what constitutes small and usable and what is
too small and unusable.

• The best-known example of ergonomic knowledge being applied to HCI issues

is Fitts law.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Fitts’ law
• Fitts’ law is a mathematical formula which relates the time required to
move to a target as a function of the distance to the target and the size
of the target itself, say moving a pointer using a mouse to a particular
button.
• It is expressed mathematically as follows:
– T(time to move) = k log2(D/S + 0.5)

– where k ~ 100 ms, D is the distance between the current (cursor) position and
the target, and S is the size of the target.

• Thus one can calculate the time to move a distance of 15 cm to a button of

size 2 cm as
– T = 100 log2(15/2 + 0.5)= 0.207 seconds

• Fitts’ law describes motor control.

• The smaller the target and the greater the distance, the longer it will take to
hit the target.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Psychological differences
• Psychologically, people differ in a variety of ways.

• For example, people with good spatial ability will

find it much easier to find their way around and
remember a website than those with poor ability.

• Designers should design for people with poor

ability by providing good signage and clear
directions.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Individual Differences
• There are often large differences in the psychological abilities of
people.

• Some people have a good memory, others less so.

• Some people can find their way around environments better than
others, or mentally rotate objects more quickly and accurately.

• Some are good at words; others are good at numbers.

• There are differences in personality, emotional make-up and ability

to work under stress.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Novice and experts
• Novice and expert users of a technology will
typically have very different levels of
knowledge and hence requirements for design
features.

• Experts use a system regularly and learn all

sorts of details, whereas a beginner will need
to be guided through an interaction. .

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Example -2- Learning Styles

People perceive knowledge and learn

in different ways.

Can we design our learning

environments to cater for different
learning styles, abilities, and models?

• Example -1- Kahoot

• Example -2- Aleks
• Example -3- Coursera

Check your learning style. Take a test 

http://www.educationplanner.org/students/self-assessment
s/learning-styles-quiz.shtml

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Psychological tests
• Many tests have been designed to measure these differences.
We call them psychometric analysis tests.

• For example the Myers-Brigg Type Indicator is a series of

tests that results in people being classified as one of 16
personality types.

• Others classify people as one of five personality types known

as OCEAN: Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness,
Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Neuroticism.

• Designers need to consider the range of differences between

people and the demands that their designs make on people’s
psychological abilities.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Mental models
• The understanding and knowledge that we possess of something is often
referred to as a ‘mental model’ (e.g. Norman, 1998).

• If people do not have a good mental model of something, they can only perform
actions by routine.

• If something goes wrong, they will not know why and will not be able to recover.

• This is often the case with people using software systems, but it is also the case
with ‘simpler’ domestic systems such as central heating systems, thermostats and
so on.

• A key design principle is to design things so that people will form correct and
useful mental models of how they work and what they do.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Developing a mental model
• People develop mental models through
• interacting with systems,
• observing the relationship between their actions and the
behaviors of the system
• reading any manuals or other forms of explanation that
come with a system.

• So, it is important that designers provide sufficient

information in the interface (and any accompanying
documentation) for people to form an accurate mental
mode.
Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Social differences

• People make use of systems, products and services for very different reasons.

• They have different goals in using systems.

• They have different motivations for using systems.

• Some people will be very interested in a particular system, others will just
want to get a simple task completed. These motivations change at different
times.
• Language differences are of course crucial to understanding

• Cultural differences affect how people interpret things.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Example -1- Culture

In the US a tick is used for acceptance and a cross for rejection, but
in Britain a tick or a cross can be used to show acceptance (e.g. a
cross on a voting paper).

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Activities
• Next lecture.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011
 Textbook Reading
• Read Chapter-2- from your
textbook, accessible on the
blackboard.

Benyon, Designing Interactive Systems: A comprehensive guide to HCI and interaction design, 2nd Edition, © Pearson Education Limited 2011