There are experiences that are average and just okay. And there are those you really REALLY enjoy. White rice is okay but in jollof rice I am well pleased.
I’m currently taking a UX course on Interaction Design Foundation (they’ve got some real interesting content) and we’ve gotten to this lesson on Designing for Peak Experience. I lightly amused myself before the class by thinking it would be about Peak Milk. Anyway, I enjoyed the class (I’ve actually enjoyed the course so far, plus the professor, Alan Dix, has a sense of humor) and I thought I’d write myself a summary of the lesson;
Peak experiences are things that are important and special to a particular niche and sometimes a minority of people. As against designing for a general group of people where we create personas (fictional characters formed from a broad description of your general users) and the design is good enough that it can be used by a lot of people. Creating peak experiences on the other hand means designing for a possibly extreme and narrow niche who will really really love what you have designed.
Peak experiences will always be chosen over the general good-enough-for-everyone experiences. Alan Dix explains this by comparing serving baked beans vs a Mars chocolate bar at a kids get-together. Then further explains it by comparing a Mars chocolate bar available for everyone vs having a choice where this person chooses Mars, another Kit Kat and another Hershey’s. Personally, I would eat Mars only if it was the only chocolate available (Bounty is on this table too). Which drove home the point of choosing what we really are excited about over what is on average “just there”.
However, if an experience is more functional rather than user-centered, it is less likely you would be designing a peak experience. An example here is making a phone call — with a phone (I mean). You would enter a phone number, place a call, speak and be spoken to and end the call. This is a functional experience that everyone has in common and is not based on individual choice. Compared to the experience of say, owning an iPhone and what you want it to say about you or what it makes you feel about yourself.
Sometimes designing a peak experience might come from a bright idea or concept and it might come from a technology (should I design a 50 terabyte disk?). And asking how is this going to be useful? Not to the entire world but to a specific niche of people.
At the end of the class, there’s a short test/question which goes — If you were designing technology to emulate or support a non-technological experience, can you think of how you might go about creating a design that supports that experience?
They gave a sample answer:
Eating my favorite flavor of ice cream is a peak experience.
If you want to design a technology that supports the peak experience, you could focus on customization for the individual user. E.g. selling ice cream via an app that allows users to create their own flavor
This was my answer;
I enjoy reading stories and myths. But I really get excited reading about my native stories, gods, goddesses and myths.
Creating a technology around this, I might design an app that allows users to find and read stories and mythologies from their native, indigenous backgrounds.
As I wait for my grading, I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed my class. Thank you 😃
