User Interface Designing : Human Factors

Human factors science or human factors technologies is a multidisciplinary field incorporating contributions from psychology, engineering, industrial design, graphic design, statistics, operations research and anthropometric. This term covers:

• Scientific understanding of the properties of human capability (Human Factors Science).
• The application of this understanding to the design, development and deployment of systems and services (Human Factors Engineering).
• The art of ensuring successful application of Human Factors Engineering to a program (sometimes referred to as Human Factors Integration). It can also be called ergonomics.

In general, a human factor is a physical or cognitive property of an individual or social behavior which is specific to humans and influences functioning of technological systems as well as human-environment equilibrium.

Human Factors in User Interface Design

Human factor in interface designing is a discipline concerned with the design, evaluation and implementation of interactive computing systems for human use and with the study of major phenomena surrounding them. This is a well known subject of Human Factors within the Engineering field. There are many different ways to determine human computer interaction at the user interface by usability testing. Thus a new branch Human Computer Interaction.

Human–computer Interaction (HCI) involves the study, planning, and design of the interaction between people (users) and computers.The term was coined by Card, Moran, and Newell in their germinal book, "The Psychology of Human-Computer Interaction."

Interaction between users and computers occurs at the user interface (or simply interface), which includes both software and hardware.