Co-experience: Understanding user experiences in social interaction

54 2 USER EXPRERIENCE DEMYSTIFIED
pleasures have been influential in understanding the dimensions of pleasurable
experiences that people have in relation to products. (Jordan 2000) While useful
on a general level, these theories fail to reflect product experiences as something
that change over time although the product itself might stay the same and
the general expectations and values of people would also remain similar. Neither
does the hedonistic approach acknowledge the important roles that negative
and ambivalent emotions have in people’s lives (Desmet 2002). Emotions are
recognised as a motivating force in action, but the relationship between emotion
and action can vary. Emotions can be part of the stress that invites creative
release (Dewey 1980), or the reward in the hedonic pursuit of pleasure (Jordan
2000) or part of the evaluation of certain kinds of mental states achieved in interaction,
such as engagement and flow. The difference in seeing emotions as
responses to designed products compared to emotions as part of interaction
is significant. Views that include use and interaction necessarily invite including
the user and the context in a broader sense, which is necessary for understanding
user experience.
So far, the most comprehensive model that explicitly accounts for motivation
and action in user experience is the one presented by Mäkelä and Fulton
Suri. Their model sums up experience as motivated action in a context, which is
influenced by past experiences and where future expectations are also formed
(Mäkelä & Fulton Suri 2001). The examples that the work cites deal with communication
and the positive emotional experiences that relate to it, such as
joking and expressing affection – which are all emotional by nature. In their
model emotions influence motivation and thus can also direct experiences as
expectations are created and past experiences reviewed.
Jordan’s views of pleasure treat pleasure with products as something that is
sought and displeasure as something that is avoided (Jordan 2000). It is clear
that with new or old products alike, people seek experiences they enjoy – which
has also led to the study of fun. Defining “fun” in the field of human-computer
interaction has been taken up in earnest only in the last five years or so, beginning
with the “Computers and Fun” seminar in 1999 (where article 1, Mäkelä &
Battarbee 1999, was also first presented). This has led towards the serious study
of fun, Funology, a common forum for studies focused on fun, enjoyment and
engagement. Designing for fun or enjoyment is difficult: on the one hand certain
products are quite supportive of enjoyable experiences, but ultimately their
success always depends on the person’s willingness to be entertained. There
is the fun of novelty, and then enjoyment that is inherent in activities that can
be labelled as work in one context and entertainment in another. In certain environments
people are very willing to be entertained and have a good time.