I began reading Cognitive Psychology: Connecting Mind, Research and Everyday Experience to explore how people perceive, process and respond to information. This feels particularly relevant to my project because I am beginning to think more about how an autistic audience might experience and process designed environments and interactions, rather than simply thinking about what information needs to be communicated.
Introduction — Understanding the Mind
The introduction discusses the mind and the different ways it can be defined. One definition describes the mind as something that controls mental functions such as perception, attention and memory. Another describes it as a system that allows us to create perceptions of the world and achieve our goals.
Although these definitions sound similar, they present quite different ways of understanding how we interact with the world around us. The chapter also introduces decision-making and the difference between simple and choice reactions. Choice reaction time, where an additional decision-making process is required, takes on average around one tenth of a second longer. This made me think about how even very small decisions within an experience can increase the amount of cognitive processing required from somebody.
Chapter Three — Perception
Chapter Three explores how perception is created. One example describes a girl running along a beach who sees what she believes is a large piece of driftwood. As she gets closer, she realises that it is actually an old rusty umbrella. What initially appeared completely clear was changed by receiving more visual information.
The chapter argues that perception is therefore not always automatic. Instead, it can involve a complicated and largely invisible process of reasoning and interpretation. This is particularly interesting when considering designed experiences. What a designer believes is obvious may not necessarily be perceived in the same way by the person experiencing it.
Pain, Attention and the Placebo Effect The chapter also discusses pain and begins with a bottom-up process: the skin is stimulated and signals are sent towards the brain. However, perception of pain is more complicated than simply receiving these signals. One example describes a boy falling and hitting his head while playing a video game. He immediately returned to his game and did not react to the injury until he later saw blood running down his face in the mirror. Only after seeing the injury did he begin to experience and react strongly to the pain.
Another example discusses James Pokony, who received third-degree burns. During painful bandage changes at the University of Washington Burn Centre, he wore a VR headset and interacted with a simple three-dimensional virtual environment. The aim was to shift his attention away from the treatment and consequently reduce his experience of pain. This example particularly interested me because it demonstrates that attention can alter someone’s experience of a physical sensation.
Chapter Ten — Visual Imagery. Chapter Ten discusses our ability to produce images mentally when the object itself is not physically visible.
For example, if somebody asks:
Most people report mentally visualising the object before answering. This raises an interesting question discussed within the chapter: Do visual imagery and visual perception use the same mechanisms?
How Does This Relate to My Project?
The reading has shifted some of my thinking away from simply asking what should I design? and towards asking how might somebody actually perceive and process the experience I design? Perception, attention, cognitive processing and visual imagery could all become relevant when designing for autistic adults. It also makes me interested in whether an interactive experience could intentionally direct someone’s attention or allow them to mentally rehearse an unfamiliar situation before experiencing it physically.
Questions to Take Forward