Metaphors and Models: Conceptual Foundations of Representations in Interactive Systems Development

When system developers design a computer system (or other information artifact), they must inevitably make judgments as to how to abstract the worksystem and how to represent this abstraction in their designs. In the past, such abstractions have been based either on a traditional philosophy of cognition or cognitive psychology or on intuitive, spontaneous philosophies. A number of recent developments in distributed cognition (Hutchins, 1995), activity theory (Nardi, 1996), and experientialism (Lakoff, 1987) have raised questions about the legitimacy of such philosophies. In this article, we discuss from where the abstractions come that designers employ and how such abstractions are related to the concepts that the users of these systems have. In particular, we use the theory of experientialism or experiential cognition as the foundation for our analysis. HUMAN-COMPUTER INTERACTION, 1999, Volume 14, pp. 159–189 Copyright © 1999, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc. David Benyon is Professor of Human–Computer Systems at Napier University, Edinburgh, with interests in all areas of interactive systems design, particularly methods and models for design and the application of knowledge-based techniques for HCI. Manuel Imaz is a professional computer system designer undertaking research into the conceptual foundations of software engineering methods within the HCI group at Napier University. Experientialism (Lakoff, 1987) has previously only been applied to human–computer interaction (HCI) design in a quite limited way, yet it deals specifically with issues concerned with categorization and concept formation. We show how the concept of metaphor, derived from experientialism, can be used to understand the strengths and weaknesses of alternative representations in HCI design, how it can highlight changes in the paradigm underlying representations, and how it can be used to consider new approaches to HCI design. We also discuss the role that “mental spaces” have in forming new concepts and designs.