One of the main trends in the field of design and technology is to humanize technological systems, that is, to generate more human relationships between people and devices. But why should relations between people and technology be humanized? And what does it really mean for technology to be humanized?
Humanizing technology means that, as living beings, we can relate to it in a way more similar to what we do with each other. This has the objective of generating security, naturalness and transparency, to generate engagement with users, and for everything, so that the services we use are easier and more efficient. Artificial intelligence and people-centered design are the key elements for the humanization of technology.
Why artificial intelligence?
To generate and design this new range of relationships between technology and people, technology must evolve with its user, just as humans do throughout our lives. A person never gives the same answer to the same question. Therefore, thanks to the use of artificial intelligence, machines and systems are able to learn from the experience of each individual to improve the response in the future. For this reason in the design and development of service increasingly it is going to use the NLP (Natural Language Processing), which understands the question and is able to generate a response, to the NLU (Natural Language Understanding), in the AI “understands” the user at a deeper level, generating responses that conclude in experiences much closer to what could be a real conversation between two people. Two examples of this could be Facebook or Oscar chatbots, a new style of health insurance that is simple, intuitive and humane.
Why the design?
Henry Drefuss, author of Designing for People said: “When the point of contact between the product and people is a point of friction, the designer has failed. Instead, if people feel more secure, more comfortable and therefore more willing to buy and consume, in a more efficient way – or simply happier – because of the contact generated with the product, then the designer has succeeded.” Designers’ goal is to find these points of “friction” of the person-technology relationship to redraft in the experience and interaction of the use of the product The designer, therefore, must understand both the complexity of the technological system than the user’s thought and emotional system.
How does the humanization of technology affect the digital world? What will happen to digital technology?
It is clear that digital technology is and will be present for a time in our lives, but it is necessary to understand the needs that people have to be able to see beyond. Is digital technology really implemented in a pleasant way? And transparent? And accessible to all? There is still a lot of work to be done so that the interfaces are really aligned with the expectations of the users and are so human as to not present points of friction during their use.
The trends suggest that people should be carried away by technology and, instead the spaces that surround us should be who loaded with technology (intelligent) that it should be capable of grasping our needs and giving answers in real time.
And what about the interfaces?
For this, we must start by rethinking the concept of the interface as we understand it today: a screen, a set of buttons, a smartphone, etc. To begin to see how different spaces could become their own interface and be completely intelligent. Thanks to the use of the AI to know at all the times the status and needs of each user to be able to generate totally natural, pleasant and transparent experiences where we do not even realize where the interface starts and ends. This new paradigm generates many uncertainties that must be resolved in the coming years. What is the interface really? or should there really be an interface?
Today, it seems that everything points to the future of digital technology is the “no interface”, where everything happens as naturally as in life itself.
Our SlashGirl, Remedios Martínez, UI/UX/CX Specialist, is the author of this post.
