1. Becca
Kennedy
Advanced HF
12/8/11
DESIGNING
TECHNOLOGY FOR
CHILDREN

2.  How children function differently from adults
 Cognitive Development
 Sensory and Perceptual Development
 Motor Development
 Designing interfaces for different age groups
 Sensorimotor stage
 Preoperational stage
 Operational stage
 Concrete Operational stage
 Involving children in the design process
 General Questions
OVERVIEW

3.  How is designing technology for children different
than designing technology for adults?
THE ULTIMATE QUESTION

4. HOW CHILDREN FUNCTION DIFFERENTLY
FROM ADULTS

5.  Information Processing Speed
 Improves as the child learns to guide their own attention (Berk,
2005, p. 333) and working memory capacity increases
 Working memory
 Is limited to about two items in 2.5-year-olds and five items in
7-year-olds (Kail, 2003)
 Increased rate of rehearsal and better mnemonic strategies as
children age
 Spatial Ability
 When preschoolers are shown a map of their classroom and
asked to place stickers to show location of objects and people,
they have more difficulty when the map is rotated (Liben &
Downs, 1993)
COGNITIVE DEVELOPMENT

6.  Critical period for visual development is between two
and six months of age (Dunsing & Kephart, 1966)
 Visual search (Gerhardstein, Kraebel, Gillis, & Lassiter, 2002)
 Parallel processing functions similarly for children and
adults
 Serial processing is less efficient for children than adults
SENSORY AND PERCEPTUAL
DEVELOPMENT

7.  2 yrs. - can manipulate small
objects
 3-4 yrs. - can use scissors
 5-6 yrs. - can write words
 7-8 yrs. - can draw pictures with
some depth cues
 Slower information processing
speed also affects motor skills
because children are slower to
adjust movements (Thomas, 1980)
FINE MOTOR DEVELOPMENT

8. DESIGNING FOR DIFFERENT AGE GROUPS

9.  Sensorimotor Stage (ages 2 and under)
 Child learns about world from experiencing consequences
of physical actions
 Preoperational Stage (ages 3 – 6)
 Child can think in images and symbols; egocentric
 Concrete Operational Stage (ages 7 – 11)
 Child can use logic appropriately; can classify objects
 Formal Operational Stage (ages 11+)
 Child can think abstractly, beyond concrete experiences;
this stage continues until adulthood
PIAGET’S STAGES OF DEVELOPMENT

10.  Should require little interaction from the child
 Novel and eye-catching events (e.g., colors and
flashing) can attract attention (Richard & Holley, 1999)
 Can use alternative interfaces besides screen-based
 E.g. Neurosmith Music Blocks
DESIGN FOR SENSORIMOTOR STAGE
(AGES 2 AND UNDER)

11.  Fisher-Price Animal Fun Game
GAMES FOR 2-YEAR-OLDS AND YOUNGER

12.  Instructions should be auditory or depicted through
pictures (cannot assume literacy)
 Targets should be larger than what is necessary for
adults (Hourcade, Bederson, Druin, & Guimbretiere, 2004)
 Icons should be large and conspicuous
 Interfaces should not require drag-and-drop
interactions, but point-and-click instead (Inkpen, 2001)
 Navigation can be aided by literal icons (a house
image to go “home”) and directional images (arrows
for moving between pages)
DESIGN FOR PREOPERATIONAL STAGE
(AGES 3 – 6)

13.  Fisher-Price Healthy Food Game
GAMES FOR 3- TO 6-YEAR-OLDS

14.  Children under age 10 still have difficulty processing
a large number of choices (Piaget, 1970), so
navigation choices should be limited to five or fewer
(Meloncon, Haynes, Varelmann, & Groh, 2010)
 Because of limited WM capacity, children benefit
from interfaces requiring recognition rather than
recall of information (Schneider, 1996)
 Children at this stage can function independently
and can usually use a mouse and keyboard easily
DESIGN FOR CONCRETE OPERATIONAL
STAGE (AGES 7 – 11)

15.  Club Penguin – online role-playing game involving a
virtual world of penguin avatars
GAMES FOR 7- TO 11-YEAR-OLDS

16. GAMES FOR 7- TO 11-YEAR-OLDS

17. GAMES FOR 7- TO 11-YEAR-OLDS

18.  Similar cognitive abilities to adults
 Can focus on minimizing cognitive load, especially for
educational resources
 Challenge for designers is capturing interest
 Children may find technology boring or insulting if it is
designed “too young” for them (Gilutz & Nielsen, 2002)
DESIGN FOR FORMAL OPERATIONAL
STAGE (AGES 11+)

19.  Starcraft II – real time strategy game
 Very fast-paced
 Requires planning , strategy, high concentration, and dexterity
GAMES FOR 11+ YEAR OLDS

20.  Club Penguin’s warning about saving the password
does not assume the child has a complete existing
mental model of computer safety
 Metaphorical conceptual models that are easily
understood by adults may not be understood by
children (e.g., the floppy disk icon)
 Consider the child’s existing knowledge
 Any other examples?
 Is there a good way around this?
DESIGNING FOR THE MENTAL MODEL OF
THE CHILD

21.  Video
 Did the iPad influence the
baby’s expectation for how a
magazine should behave?
 Or is the baby interacting with
the magazine the same way
she would if she had never
used an iPad?
TO A BABY, A MAGAZINE IS AN IPAD THAT
DOES NOT WORK

22. INVOLVING CHILDREN IN THE DESIGN
PROCESS

23.  Druin (2002) described four possible roles that
children can play in the design process of new
technologies
 User – interact with existing technologies but have no direct
input on its design
 Tester – use technology in development and provide feedback
about refinement before the technology is publically released
 Informant – interact directly with designers through interviews
and other research techniques, but designers decide how to
interpret the child’s feedback
 Design Partner – children and designers contribute equally in
the design process
INVOLVING CHILDREN IN THE DESIGN
PROCESS

24.  Druin (2005) advocates the involvement of children
as design partners
 In the design of the International Children’s Digital Library,
children provided input and critiques that were categorized and
analyzed
INVOLVING CHILDREN IN THE DESIGN
PROCESS

25.  Designed a new interface for International Children’s
Digital Library
 “Flattened” the hierarchy to make it easier to navigate
 Simultaneous presentation of most popular
categories, rather than sequential
 Evaluated usage by 6- to 11-year-olds of conjunctive
Boolean queries (selection of multiple category
buttons)
 Compared hierarchical structure and flat structure
HUTCHINSON, DRUIN, & BEDERSON
(2007)

26.  Children created more Boolean searches in the flat
interface
 For single-item searches, either flat or hierarchical
designs are useful
 For conjunctive Boolean searches, flat designs are
more useful
 What did you find interesting about this article?
HUTCHINSON, DRUIN, & BEDERSON
(2007)

27.  What do you think about the ICDL interface?
 Can digital children’s books through resources like
the ICDL replace hardcopy books?
 What kinds of difficulties might researchers face
when working with children?
 Regarding parents?
 Regarding the use of video with usability studies?
 Regarding quality of children’s feedback?
GENERAL QUESTIONS

28.  How might child ergonomics contribute to design of
technology for children?
 What other areas of HF might benefit from making
distinctions between adult and child users?
 How might improving technology benefit children in
the future? Do you think “technologizing” of children
can be problematic?
GENERAL QUESTIONS