Developing a Framework for Intuitive Human-Computer Interaction:

Many technology marketing materials tout the intuitive nature of products, but current human-computer interaction (HCI) guidelines provide limited methods to help designers create this experience beyond making them easy to use. This paper proposes a definition for intuitive interaction with specific attributes to allow designers to create products that elicit the target experience. Review of relevant literatures provides empirical evidence for the suggested working definition of intuitive HCI: interactions between humans and high technology in lenient learning environments that allow the human to use a combination of prior experience and feedforward methods to achieve an individual’s functional and abstract goals. Core concepts supporting this definition were compiled into an organizational framework that includes: seeking user goals, performing well-learned behavior, determining what to do next, metacognition, knowledge in the head, and knowledge in the world. This paper describes these concepts and proposes design approaches that could facilitate intuitive behavior and suggests areas for further research.