Duquesne University User Experience supports the MEDIA department’s undergraduate Digital Media Arts and graduate Master of Fine Arts programs.

DUQUX is focused on:

• teaching and learning and academic-based research related to User eXperience and Design,
• designing, researching, and evaluating the experiences people have with products and services they use in their daily lives,
• working in the space of human-centered design, digital media, and technology to envision new designs and ways of designing,
• using media and technology to solve complex design problems, and create engaging user experiences and
• venturing to design for tomorrow’s innovation.

User eXperience Design is about designing physical and/or digital products and services that are useful and easy-to-use.  Think about the last time you used an app, website, household appliance, automobile infotainment system or brought a cup of coffee. Was it useful, easy or enjoyable? Donald Norman, a leader in the Interaction Design field, suggests that designing a user experience must include:

1. improving performance when someone uses the product or service,
2. positive emotions, and
3. the recognition that the product or service exists in a larger inter-related context of component parts. The inter-related component parts (system) impact a person’s experience with a product or service.

Imagine a coffee shop provides an intuitive app.  However, the app only supports orders-only so you had to pay in-store with cash, no cards and orders take long to fulfill. You’ll likely have a negative experience and buy coffee elsewhere. An intuitive app is only one  component part to make a positive experience. UX designers use a variety of processes and methods to account for and endeavor to design the entire experience.

Human Centered Design: As a form of problem-solving, design is the conceiving, planning, research, and making of things such as products, ideas, interactions, services, systems, applications and more. It draws on the arts and humanities, sciences, engineering and business. Design process models typically include stages for planning (research) and analysis, design, development, and evaluation. And since we follow a human centered design approach, the individual is always a focal point. We endeavor to understand people and how they use and experience products and services – to help us improve our designs.

Digital Media: The word “Media” can be interpreted in many ways (e.g., Facebook, Twitter, etc.). Janet Murray defines media as “…any combination of materials and cultural practices that is used to support intentional, meaningful communication, expression, or learning” or extend human capabilities. Almost all media today are created or exits in digital form. Lev Manovich noted that media are programmable objects and because of their programmable nature, infinite possibilities exist for rapid, ongoing innovation. The digital material and computer from which media are created today are so unique that in the 1990s theorists coined the term “new” media and contended that they were revolutionary. As programmable objects, media  (e.g., graphics, sounds, photographs) are inherently interactive.  They can be automated, deconstructed to the individual pixel and reconstructed and recombined almost instantly to form new types of media – creating almost endless possibilities for design and creativity.

www.aiga.org

uxpa.org

www.hfes.org

ixda.org

sigchi.org

idmaa.org

www.nngroup.com

ixda.org

interactions.acm.org

www.uxmatters.com