The Design Of Happyability-Using Applications On iOS And Android Platform As An Example

Wang, R. W. Y.1, Liu, Yu-Chun 2

1

Department of Industrial and Commercial Design Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taiwan wyw@mail.ntust.edu.tw

Department of Industrial and Commercial Design Taiwan University of Science and Technology, Taiwan kirstieliu@gmail.com rather high level of effort to enable excellent usability of Apps, but at the same time they have to make sure that the smart phones they designed are equipped with basic functions. Usability has been a focused topic for years regarding human-computer interaction(HCI), including user interface(UI) and operation flow. When we are discussing pleasurability that is related to emotions and feelings, we need to incorporate usability. This paper does an inter-review and exploration on usability and pleasurability topic. The currently hit Apps brings tremendous commercial benefits, but to make a good design to enable Apps be appealing to consumers has become an important research subject for apps development teams. Countries around the world are promoting happiness, therefore, we are seeing GNH(Gross National Happiness) [36,37 being on the spot. GDP and GNP are no longer what people are longing for, owning a wealthy life is no comparison to being happy and well. However, there is still no answer on how people can execute happiness. According to Jordan[19]; Maslow[23]; Norman, Ortony, and Russell[28], a good product has to be well-functioned, splendid usability and also satisfies humans basic psychological needs. In the past, peoples definition on pleasurability is limited to pleasure; however, pleasure is a kind of happiness[29]. In addition, according to the different intensities of pleasure, there are other classifications of positive emotions[32]. The pleasure we mentioned here is not temporary. Different types of Apps satisfy users different levels psychological needs and there should certain design factors that can arouse users interests and positive emotions and then come to be in love with the device.
LITERATURE REVIEW Happiness and Emotion

ABSTRACT

Along with the rising of smart phone, applications(apps) have become a booming market. People are aware of the importance of living quality both materially and spiritually, Happiness also rises as a goal that people are pursuing nowadays. Therefore, the research focus of Apps has gradually shifted from usability to a more human-centered focus which involves pleasurability of emotion feedback. Users needs usually increase from functionality, usability to pleasurability. To distinguish the variables of pros and cons of Apps, it involves different levels of inter-discussion. According to some literatures, pleasurability is part of happiness, therefore, this paper concludes happyability is a collection of peoples positive emotion which is provided by products, including seven increasing emotional levels: meaning, engagement, excited/ebullient, elated/happy, pleasure, serene/contented, placid/calm, combines with (Jordan, 1999) the developing model of happiness version of apps development of the consumers needs pyramid, which will provide reference for future Apps design.
Keywords

Emotional design, happyability

INTRODUCTION

applications(apps),

usability,

Apple has only presented 4 generations of iphone so far, but it has made significant sales. What is the main reason that makes iphone so loved by consumers despite that its hardware device is not the strongest among other smart phone companies? These smart phone seek personalized conveniences and better portability which symbolizes more accessible environment. The virtual digital information increases more interaction with peoples surrounding environment, therefore, we are seeing various Apps appearing on the market for users to download. Currently, the two main Apps markets are iOS and Android, which differs from each other. The quality of iOS is high but users need to pay more and also it has to be examined by Apple before presenting; on the other hand, the quality of Android is not standardized .but its free and does not need to pass platforms examination which allows Android develops freer but of rather poor quality. The quality and quantity of Apps are one of the key elements for buyers to consider when purchasing. With the advanced technology, researchers and designers need to inject a

Emotion is the key element that drives consumers feeling. A products appearance, color, material, size and even character arrangement and graphic design of the interface affect strongly on the sale performance[15,27]. Vocabularies like optimism, pleasure, pleasurability, happy, hedonic happiness, gladness, joyfulness and well-being are defined according to psychology, neuroscience, humancomouter interaction, ergonomic and kansei engineering in different research projects. There are two sayings regarding the positive emotions of

a product- pleasurability and satisfaction. According to literatures, satisfaction is a kind of positive emotion such as fun, joy, pleasure, and aesthetic value[33,38]. Pleasurability is one of the most popular features[16,18,21,34] Happiness and emotion are in which one experience feeling ranging from contentment and satisfaction to bliss and intense joy. Emotion is difficult to pin down and study because it is in context, volatile and ephemeral[11]. As can be found in Oxford Dictionary and Merriam-Webster Dictionary, happy is mostly used in definition for vocabularies like pleasure, being defined as a state of feeling or being happy or satisfied [30]; contentment, being defined as a feeling of happiness or satisfaction[6]; bliss being defined as extreme happiness[4] joy, being defined as a feeling of great happiness [20]; bliss, being defined as complete happiness [5] and joy, being defined as a state of happiness or felicity[19]. Gathering arguments regarding happiness from different scholars, we can discover that happiness is a complex and complicated emotion[22] which has different rankings in different levels of intensity. People attach different vocabularies according to different intensity of happiness. Also, we can conclude from researches of psychologists dated back to one hundred years or so ago, psychologists from the 20th century or contemporary psychologists that happiness has stronger positive emotion than pleasure. Pleasure is the first step of happiness in the field of psychology. Darwin[7]considers happiness of different levels, which contains many smaller hedonic elements; Peterson and Seligman[29] discovers from research on optimism that there are 3 components of happiness, they are pleasure, engagement and meaning. Pleasure is derived from one Nielsen[24] Games Weather Social Networking Maps/Navigation/Search Music News Entertainment Banking/Finance Video/Movies Shopping/Retail Dining/Restaurant Sports Productivity Communication Food/Drink Travel Health Education/Learning Household/Personal Care
Table1. Apps categories

object, which is a pure and smaller positive emotion; engagement is derived from applying personal skills on daily life to gain satisfaction; meaning even exceeds the prior, which we gain from a even higher purpose of jobs[3,37] Based on the extent of pleasuredispleasure and degreeof-arousal, Russell[32] divided affect dimension into high-arousal positive emotion ranking into pleasure, elated/happy and excited/ebullient, and he also divided low-arousal positive emotion ranking into pleasure, serene/contented, placid/calm. These are all positive emotions, however, they differ from one and another due to dissimilar arousal degrees.
Applications (Apps)

The competition of Apple iOS system is the device with Android platform such as htc corporation series and Samsung products. These two distinct platforms cause dissimilar coding environment, structures, size of the screen, charge of apps market, manipulating flows and marketing standards etc. Hence, its one bigger and consequential reason that varied users interface. Even though its the same functional application designed with distinguishing characteristics, nevertheless, they still have their own proponents. Apps is not different from industrial designed products, the designing items not only include the basic functioning[17], but they also contain operating flow arrangement and interface design. Based on the interactive designing concept of Verplank, Gurevich and Mathews[35], there are two elements-feeling and behavior which exist in a circular cycle that bring stimulation and response. Some stimulation cause certain responses, therefore, we can say that certain kind User2[10] Photography Game Free On Sale Music and Fitness Calendar What's New Guns TO DO LIST Discounts Apple[2] Calculate Entertainment Games News Productivity Search Tools Social Networking Sports Travel Utilities Weather

User1[14] Talking and Social group Local Services Conversion and Transformati on Multimedia Linking with Computer Widgets

User2[1] Books Education Entertainment Games Healthcare Fitness iPad Only Photography Productivity Utility

of positive emotions can be aroused through a stimulus which is what we called emotional design[11]. With the continuous upgrading of apps, users have to update in accordantly, therefore, if there is no system for storing, users will easily lose the deserved effects from apps, this situation leads us to notice the importance of apps classification on smart phone development. There are various ways of user habits. According to Table 1, it shows how smart phone manufacturers, market survey companies and 3 users classify apps. The classification from Nielsen[24 is the more detailed, whereas Apple and other users are simpler. We cannot define the better, for it is up to users habits.
RESEARCH METHODS

This research finds out the present situation of happiness, assess towards two platforms, information from apps developers and users through document analysis. We gather and examine information regarding emotion, happiness, pleasurability, apps, iOS, Android, human-computer interaction through literature survey method. Via these information, we can compare present situation with related theories to comprehend current situation more objectively for further research analysis..
RESULTS Apps Inquiry Levels and Types

Personnel of various related fields are working hard on ensuring benign communication between people and machine in order to maintain the original function, usability and pleasurability of machine[17]. From the view of apps (machine), the development focus of human-computer interaction lies in good usability, high pleasurability or functionality and a system that meets users needs. For example: a PDF reader should have its basic function-open PDF files, this is the so-called functionality. Besides opening a PDF file, the design of the device has to enable its users the function of flipping pages. Example like this concerns not only functionality but also usability. Smooth operation of the app that affects peoples emotion is evaluated of the apps usability. Another example is app games, these games may be entertaining but may not be practical. However, it depends on different users. Some people regard the relaxation that derive from playing games a function; however, generally people consider opening a PDF file more functional than playing app games. This conclusion may be drawn from the economical point of view or from number of people in demand of it; however, the range of functionality is not within discussion of this paper.
Categories of Happyability

With alternation of eras and advancing of technology, the research on hand-held device of the past has developed from via functionality to usability and pleasurability[17]. Combining the related design factors of functionality and usability, we can observe the corelations within. We can discover from related document that in both standard of functionality and usability, efficiency is the key condition. The degree of satisfaction within usability is related to the top ranking of pleasurability. This phenomenon shows the inseparable relation of functionality, usability and pleasurability. Human-computer interaction is interdisciplinary.

From users point of view on apps, human have basic reaction to stimulus, we can further understand the role that apps plays through the reaction. Norman[26]addressed that there are three levels to a human brain: (1) visceral level; (2)behavioral level includes the part of brain that controls humans daily behavior; (3)reflective level is the part of brain that deliberate. When we incorporate these three levels into product design[26,28]), the bottom level-visceral level is related to the appearance of design that leads to users first impression on the product; the second level-behavioral level is related to the enjoyment and effectiveness which is linked to peoples experience of the product, whether its user friendly or not. The highest level-reflective

Figure 1. Comparison on Relation of demand

Figure 2. The Interaction Relation Graph of Happy Apps and Users

level is linked to self-image, personal satisfaction and memories. Any other reaction like emotion, feelings and cognition operate also in this level. From Figure 1 we can see that whether its the consumer- needs pyramid provided from product provider[17] or the three levels of designing from Norman along with Theory of Human Motivation of product user[23], the lower the level, the closer it is to the humans basic need; the higher the level, the closer it is to humans psychological need. Desmet and Hekkert[9]considered peoples experience on products consists of three levels: aesthetic experience, experience of meaning, and emotional response. Aesthetics are essential to the design of any products, especially computer user interfaces, because they have strong association with our emotions, feelings, moods and motivations [12,13,25.34]. In the field of human-computer interaction, users satisfaction level and pleasurability are just vocabularies, so in reality, what is the degree of satisfaction and pleasurability? [8,22]We could measure learnability, memorability, efficiency and errors through time or accumulating time, but we couldnt do so in the same way as to the principle attribution. Emotion is an uncountable attribution that couldnt be expressed objectively. The users level of satisfacation from the past research is complex and is a structure that involves multiple emotions [22]. According to the concluding results from Chapter 2, this research shows that stimulation induces positive emotion which is shown by the word Happy. The level of this feeling is called Happyability. Happyability is devided into seven levels of meaning, engagement, excited/ebullient, welated/happy, pleasure, serene/contented and placid/calm according to its intensity.
Apps categories on iOS and Android platforms

Facebook, Twitter) (2) Local Service: maps, navigation, search, shopping, retail, dining, restaurant, food, drink, travel (3) Multimedia: music, video, movies, photography, MP3 music and composing, radio, telephone recording, books, education, learning (4)Widgets: weather, news, calculate, search tools, banking/finance, stock market future exchange rate, time(alarm), date(calendar and memo), telephone and social network, email, text message integration, dictionary (5)Utility/Productivity: office, pdf, filing, decompress, remote linking control, sys synchronizing, wireless message management, (6) Entertainment: games (7) Personal Care: healthcare and fitness, sports, household. Different types of apps elicit different levels of emotional reaction. Some tools are function-guided and some are games for mere relaxation purpose, due to the difference, the degree of happyability an individual reaches is not of the same level.
Happy Apps Model

We can conclude that this research provides the interaction relation graph of happy apps and users(Figue2). The graph on the left illustrates that the designing of apps started out from functionality, usability to the happyability part that brings out humans positive emotional reaction. The graph on the right shows the seven categories of Apps which creates a twoway interaction of users behavior and feeling. Graph on the right also represents a stimulus, an event or an activity that arouses emotions of different levels shown on the graph on the left. Products like apps is a fruitful result derived from multiple domains of the fields. Therefore, the mode that this research developed combines several theories from psychology, human-computer interaction and so on. This research focuses on happiness, following are two examples of happyabiliy: though a PDF reader enables users to open PDF files without errors, which may provide brief pleasure from its operating interface and users may feel placid due to its smooth operation. On the other hand, a social networking app like Vibre, which

Apps are classified into the following seven items: (1)Social Networking: Communication (i.g. IM, VoIP, MSN, Skype, Google talk-which includes voice message which can be incorporated into telephone category,

has the function of talking with friend and has almost zero error. Users can feel welated already just by the fascinating interface design; moreover, people feel the engagement within their social groups through this software. A trend we can see from the two examples above is that different types of apps may cause users various degrees of happyability.
CONCLUSION

of Product Experience. International Journal of Design, 1(1), 57-66. 10. editor, i. (2011). Chomp visual interface-special random category of app Retrieved 11/14, 2011, from http://iapp.com.tw/ex/topic_inside_android.php? id=242 11. Hassenzahl, M. (2004). Emotions can be quite ephemeral; we cannot design them. interactions Funology, 11(5), 4648. 12. Heidegger, M. (1978). Being and Time. Oxford: Blackwell 13. Hybs, I. (1996). Beyond the Interface: A Phenomenological View of Computer Systems Design. Leonardo, 29(3), 215-223. 14. jeff0926. (2010). My classification of app and thoughts Retrieved 12/1, 2011, from http://5i01.com/topicdetail.php?f=423&t=1627115 15. Jenkins, S., Brown, R., & Rutterford, N. (2009). Comparing Thermographic, EEG, and Subjective Measures of Affective Experience During Simulated Product Interactions. International Journal of Design, 3(2), 53-65. 16. Jordan, P. W. (1998). Human factors for pleasure in product use. Applied Ergonomics, 29(1), 25-33. 17. Jordan, P. W. (1999). Pleasure with products: human factors for body, mind and soul (Green, W. S., & Jordan, P. W. ed.). London: Taylor & Francis. 18. Jordan, P. W. (2000). Designing pleasurable products. An introduction to the new human factors. New York: Taylor & Francis. 19. Joy.(n.d.). In Merriam-Webster dictionary. Retrieved from http://www.merriamwebster.com/dictionary/joy 20. joy. (n.d.). In Oxford dictionary. Retrieved from http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/joy? q=joy 21. Jung, D. J. H. J., & Love, D. T. (2008). A design method based on social behaviours for pleasurable user experiences in human-computer interaction Paper presented at the 6th Cinference on Design & Emotion 2008:Dare to Desire, Hong Kong Polytechnic University. 22. Lindgaard, G., & Dudek, C. (2003). What is this evasive beast we call user satisfaction. Interacting with Computers ,15, 429-452. 23. Maslow, A. (1943). A theory of human motivation. Psychological review, 50(4), 370-396. 24. nielsen. (2011). Play Before Work: Games Most Popular Mobile App Category in US Retrieved 12/18, 2011, from http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/ games-most-popular-mobile-app-category/

Smart phone acts like a personal secretary to most smart phone users. Apps play the same role in the offices or at home as tool boxes to users which leads users towards the grand gate of the digital world. However, a product as influential and almost thoroughly engaged in peoples life, there must be much more research on how to satisfy needs in various aspect of peoples life. Happiness is a status that everyone is pursuing. Device that can bring such feeling surly need an irresistible sugar-coated benefit besides its basic function. Although people have different definition towards happiness, product designer can still predict peoples expectation on apps base on peoples basic psychological need. Future research direction will be focusing on case studies, from dealing and analyzing the real cases, we can better conclude the design principle and understand users reaction through experiment. This research is highly applicable, we are including windows phone into our future research besides iOS and Android. Apps on hand-held device and tablet PCs is a long-term and continuous goal of our research.
REFERENCES

1. Ai, D.-M. (2010). New function! Category table of recommended iPhone app Retrieved 10/15, 2011, from http://www.iphone4c.com/? p=815 2. Apple. (2011). All Apps Categories Retrieved 11/24, 2011, from http://www.apple.com/webapps/ 3. AskDefine. (2011). pleasurable Retrieved 04/15, 2011, from http://pleasurable.askdefine.com/ 4. bliss.(n.d.).In Oxford dictionary. Retrieved from http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/pleasure? q=pleasure 5. bliss.(n.d.).In Merriam-Webster dictionary. Retrieved from http://www.merriamwebster.com/dictionary/bliss 6. contentment.(n.d.).In Oxford dictionary. Retrieved from http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/contentme nt?q=contentment 7. Darwin, C. (Ed.). (1838). Notebook M. Ithaca,N.Y.: Cornell University Press. 8. Desmet, P.(2011). Design for Happiness-Four Ingredients for Designing Meaningful a Activites. Paper presented at the IASDR2011, Delft. 9. Desmet, P., & Hekkert, P.(2007). Framework

25. Norman, D. A. (2002). Emotion & Design: Attractive things work better. Interactions, 9(4), 36-42. 26. Norman, D. A. (2004). Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things. New York: Basic. 27. Norman, D. A. (2005). Emotional Design: Why We Love (or Hate) Everyday Things (H.-h. Wang, C.-L. Weng, Y.-P. Cheng & C.-J. Jhang, Trans.). Taipei: Garden City. 28. Norman, D. A., Ortony, A., & Russell, D. M. (2003). Affect And Machine Design_Lessons For The Development Of Autonomous Machines. IBM Systems Journal, 42(1), 38-44. 29. Peterson, C., Park, N., & Seligman, M. E. P. (2005). Orientations to Happiness and Life Satisfaction: The Full Life Versus The Empty Life. Journal of Happiness Studies, 6, 2541. 30. pleasure. .(n.d.). .In Oxford dictionary. Retrieved from http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/pleasure? q=pleasure 31. Preece, J. (1998). Guide To Usability Human Factors In Computing. Taipei: Pegatron corp. 32. Russell, J. A. (1980). A circumplex affect model. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 39(6), 1161-1178.

33. Russell, J. A. (2003). Core affect and the psychological construction of emotion. Psychological Review, 110(1), 145172. 34. Scollan, R. (2007). Designing a Pleasurable Interface: Emotion in HumanComputer Interaction Retrieved 04/24, 2011, from http://74.125.155.132/scholar? q=cache:Vej68Dez2uIJ:scholar.google.com/ +Designing+a+Pleasurable+Interface: +Emotion+in+Human %E2%80%90Computer+Interaction&hl=zhTW&as_sdt=0&as_vis=1 35. Verplank, B., Gurevich, M., & Mathews, M. (2002). The Plank: designing a simple haptic controller. Paper presented at the NIME '02 Proceedings of the 2002 conference on New interfaces for musical expression, Singapore. 36. Gross national happiness. (n.d.). Retrieved August09, 2011, from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gross_national_happin ess 37. Yang, S.-J. (2005). Learn happiness from Bhutan. CommonWealth, 314. 38. Yik, M. S. M., Russell, J. A., & Barrett, L. F. (1999). Structure of self-reported current affect Integration and beyond. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 77, 600-619.