Top 28 Quotes & Sayings by Donald Norman

Explore popular quotes and sayings by an American scientist Donald Norman.
Last updated on September 19, 2024.
Donald Norman

Donald Arthur Norman is an American researcher, professor, and author. Norman is the director of The Design Lab at University of California, San Diego. He is best known for his books on design, especially The Design of Everyday Things. He is widely regarded for his expertise in the fields of design, usability engineering, and cognitive science. He is a co-founder of the Nielsen Norman Group, along with Jakob Nielsen. He is also an IDEO fellow and a member of the Board of Trustees of IIT Institute of Design in Chicago. He also holds the title of Professor Emeritus of Cognitive Science at the University of California, San Diego. Norman is an active Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), where he spends two months a year teaching.

Isn't one of your first exercises in learning how to communicate to write a description of how to tie your shoelaces? The point being that it's basically impossible to use text to show that.
Everyday people are not very good designers.
User-centered design means working with your users all throughout the project. — © Donald Norman
User-centered design means working with your users all throughout the project.
Readers always seem to think that the author has some control over the design of their books.
I believe that robots should only have faces if they truly need them.
Our information lives will be better served when we are free to get to our information from wherever we are, with any device available.
I think there is a tendency in science to measure what is measurable and to decide that what you cannot measure must be uninteresting.
To me, error analysis is the sweet spot for improvement.
As for all those mistakes I make - they are on purpose - to teach you how to deal with them.
Knowing how people will use something is essential.
Sure, one can always get the students to relax and be happy - entertained, but although being laid back and relax can also lead to creativity, mostly it means that nothing much gets done.
In my opinion, no single design is apt to be optimal for everyone.
If you think the products don't match what you want from a product, don't buy it.
And to get real work experience, you need a job, and most jobs will require you to have had either real work experience or a graduate degree.
You won't catch me giving clear lectures.
I believe that the Apple Shuffle is an excellent compromise among the conflicting requirements of simplicity, elegance, size, battery life, and function.
Also note that invariably when we design something that can be used by those with disabilities, we often make it better for everyone.
A big ethical question is what happens after people stop using the device. Does it degrade the environment? Could it have been designed so it would actually be good for the environment?
We expert teachers know that motivation and emotional impact are what matter.
Market segmentation s a natural result of the vast differences among people.
I've been looking at the iPod- the Apple iPod. One of the interesting things about the iPod, one of the things that people love most about it is not the technology; it's the box it comes in.
Beauty and brains, pleasure and usability - they should go hand in hand. — © Donald Norman
Beauty and brains, pleasure and usability - they should go hand in hand.
I prefer design by experts - by people who know what they are doing.
It is relatively easy to design for the perfect cases, when everything goes right, or when all the information required is available in proper format.
Am I an Apple bigot? No. I can critique their products and their customer service philosophy. But overall, they do better than any other player.
The problem with emotion was that it was clearly something important, but-at least according to the old philosophy-it was something to overcome.
So what does a good teacher do? Create tension - but just the right amount.
Scientists are always skeptics.
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