Attention, Attraction, and the Aesthetic Value:

Understanding Beauty as a Problem of User Experience

Uday Gajendar
UI Design Group, Oracle Corp.
500 Oracle Parkway
Redwood Shores, CA 94065 USA
+1 650 506 3643
uday.gajendar@oracle.com
ABSTRACT

The Environment of Human Experience

This paper approaches beauty as a problem of user

experience. What does beauty mean for the digital? To
understand how to connect analog aesthetic expressions
with consumer digital products, I suggest the nature of
experience may depend upon three connective elements:
attention, attraction, and aesthetic value, or beauty. Using
philosophical perspectives and practical examples, I bridge
theory with application to show that beauty, as it pertains to
interaction design, can become an emergent value of
human-product interactions that operates in experience
through human attention and emotional attraction. Thus,
this paper offers an interpretation of beauty beyond art,
suggesting a legitimate, positive role for aesthetic value in
affective experience, to help designers discuss beauty and
apply the ideas.

However, let us consider the environment of human

experience, encompassing everything with which people
interact, and their related emotional responses. Nielsen and
Norman often point out the variety of products fraught with
unhealthy ergonomics, ugly aesthetics or improper
interfaces [7]. Along with digital abundance come issues of
information overload, ubiquitous access, and media
multiplicity that contribute to the disaffection and
frustration of alienating artifacts (e.g., a data dump of
links or an overly complex remote control) or ephemeral
delights (e.g., trivial Flash animations) [4]. Thus, in
addition to works of art and nature within human
experience, devices and software increasingly influence
users attitudes and behaviors.

Keywords

Beauty, attention, attraction, aesthetics, interaction design,

user experience
INTRODUCTION

Many would agree that Michaelangelos David or Monets

Water Lilies is a masterpiece of beauty, compelling viewers
smile in awe. But is it possible for a digital product such as
a cell phone or a website to be characterized as beautiful?
How does that depend upon the relationship between a user
and the quality of her interaction? It may seem odd to ask
such questions, since the concept beauty is nearly
synonymous with the Western development of art from
Classical Platonism, Aristotelian metaphysics and
imitation, to 18th and 19th century emphases on nature and
emotionquite far from objects of commercial distribution
and consumption [4]!

A glance at our current environment of activity and the

products influencing our lifestyles suggests that the quality
of interaction is a vital issue. Recent writings confirm this:
Forlizzi and Ford describe an initial framework supporting
experience goals in product design [3]. And Pine and
Gilmore provide a business rationale for meaningful
experiences, as the next major economic value offering [8].
Asking the Question: Beauty in Design?

So, we must ask, can there be beauty in the experience of

the digital? The implication is that the heart of our problem
is translating that poignant quality of aesthetic, analog
expressions into digital, consumer experiencesin
language and action. In other words, how can designers
make the commonly digital momentous instead of
momentary and promote expressions that suggest what is
awe-inspiring, just as a Renaissance painting? A painting
and a cell phone admittedly involve differing purposes and
processes. However, the benefit of humanizing
technological expression so that human activities (e.g.,
communication, interaction, etc.) become fulfilling applies
to all objects of human effortand suggests an arena for
beauty beyond art and nature, towards designing user
experience [4].
In this paper we will explore the notion that beautyan
emergent value of human attention and emotional
attractioncan help designers plan and craft artifacts that
offer a rewarding, memorable encounter.

An Hypothesis of Experience

Perhaps what connects the uniquely aesthetic quality of art

to digital products is the nature of experience. Many
theories abound about experience [3], which generally
suggest that it involves a subjectively interpreted,
continuous stream of psychological and physical
phenomena brought into awareness through an interaction
or communication [4]. Going further, I hypothesize that
experience may depend upon the association of three
elements:
1) The relationship between a person and an object
2) The process of being drawn to that object and
engaged on multiple levels: emotional,
intellectual, physical
3) The value that arises from the attractive encounter
These elements may be labeled as attention, attraction,
and beauty; though among various interpretations there
may be other suitable terms. Below well look at some
philosophical frameworks and practical examples that
identify beauty in action.
PHILOSOPHICAL PERSPECTIVES OF BEAUTY

To provide guidance I refer to two philosophical

perspectives of aesthetics. George Santayana and John
Dewey were thinkers of the late 19th and early 20th
centuries who studied aesthetics in relation to experience
and expression, terms central to present design thinking.
According to these authors, beauty occurs either as an
internal act of projecting an emotion into an object or
through the external interactions of an organism with its
environment [2,9].
Santayanas The Sense of Beauty

Santayana looks into the origins and conditions of beauty

as an object of human experience [9]. He deconstructs
beauty into three successive partsmaterial, form, and
expressionand declares beauty is a theory of values [9]
which originate in the emotional interest of the perceiver,
arising from her immediate perception of an object's
sensual properties. The benefit of beauty is to synthesize
the impulses of the self and achieve a singularity, a
pleasing wholeness [9]. Unity is the guiding principle of
making and perceiving so as to secure harmony and
balance amidst chaotic, disorderly distractions. Beauty is a
value desired for its own sake that emerges through the
work of the mind. The mind is seen as an organism
tending towards unity, which is a guiding principle in the
perception of sensual properties [9].
From Santayanas approach, attention is a bodily, sensory
mechanism for seeking meaningful anchors in a fluid world
of chaos and distraction. Perceptual action then transforms
into emotional and intellectual attraction, a working of the
mind upon an object to intensify the initial sensuality and
perceive form. This internal activity is guided by the
principle of unity and involves the associative process as a
means of developing expressive beauty. In addition is the

projection of emotional values and suffusion of them into

the object, to achieve a fusion of ones emotions and the
object. Beauty, then, becomes pleasure objectifieda
felt expression of unity that evokes liberation of the self,
as part of an immaterial quality of experience [4, 9].
Deweys Art as Experience

Dewey, however, focuses on the process of interaction

between a conscious being and her environmentthe
sustaining or frustrating conditions that define the
activities of a person, such as the tools, spaces, materials,
or other people [2]. Dewey shifts the emphasis of
interaction from a reflexive communicative exchange
towards an active relationship of growth and renewal.
Every experience has a structure and pattern, found in a
rhythmic doing and undergoing [2]. Dewey is especially
concerned with recovering aesthetic experiences, which
feature a dynamic integration of thought, action, and
emotion into a consummating whole via working with an
environment, or context. This comes from a process in
which change over time yields a renewed state of being,
due to a rhythmic, orderly movement bound by a distinct
beginning and end. Thus, an experience is a whole; it is
enabled by a being's active engagement that unfolds
towards a conclusion. Despite the parts, there is a single
quality that unifies the variationsemotion [2].
From Deweys view, attention is the initial impulse
towards environmental stimuli and then processed by
emotion, which provides synthesis among various parts.
Attraction is the rhythmic pattern of doing and undergoing
(pushing and pulling with an object and environment)
whereby meaning is perceived by a conscious being. It
involves a constructive process of changea reordering
and renewal of the relationship between a person and her
environment manifest as her interaction [2,4]. Dewey
avoids the term beauty for its Romantic notions, but he
pursues what may be construed as experiential beautya
harmonious balance of the intent of the maker and
perceiver towards a meaningful consummation of
movement of emotion from inception, carried through
development, and ending with an object that lives in
experience [2,4].
Commonalities of Thought

Dewey and Santayana share a concern for what is

immediate in human experience. The quality of that
moment defines and develops the lasting value of an
experience, whether it is the sensual properties of an object
or the mutual communication of action and intention.
Emotion is one of the key ingredients of such an enlivening
experience. There must be conscious awareness to yield
emotional reaction in conjunction with sensual and mental
responses [2,9].
BEAUTY IN ACTION

Using these philosophical ideas as a general framework, we

may identify examples of beauty in action.

Sony and Lifestyle Design

Sonys pioneering approach to lifestyle design

epitomized by the famed Walkman is one path to beauty,
as suggested by this comment about Sonys history of
design success: The form and functionality of [Sonys]
productshelp us design our own livesand in so doing,
enhance the most precious of all human traits: our
individuality. This is where the artifact operates within a
certain aspect of ones life, affecting behaviors, attitudes,
and perceptions, exemplifying Deweys notion of
experiential beauty [6].

mechanics results, leading to a direct engagement of the

material, akin to Santayanas illusion of disembodiment
and singular unity of being [9]. Such beauty does not live
in the environment of ones lifestyle but in the material
construction and objective processing of structures and
formulas in relation to a users activities.

Figure 2: The Apple Macintosh Interface (Photo by author)

Figure 1: The Sony Professional Concept1

A variety of concepts have featured unique materials,
colors, and shapes suitable for diverse markets. Such
concepts, like the boldly masculine and rugged
Professional (Figure 1), project distinct voices,
suggesting special arenas of use for consumers living
different lives, like a fitness enthusiast or urban youth [6].
The concepts are bound by the Sony approach to unify
emotion with performance, a merging of sensual beauty
and functional power, to achieve a pleasing artifact and
user experience [6]. Former head of The Sony Design
Center, Nobuyuki Idei, has said, The design should draw
our hand, create a fire in the mind and make us smile as we
pick it up [6]. The pattern of interaction is familiar, as the
whole being is pulled towards an artifact, similar to
Deweys impulsion and subsequent push/pull dynamic.
What results is an evocative engagement that resonates
with the self and renews perceptions and behaviors
throughout an activity, within a context.
Apple and Machine Beauty

For computer scientist David Gelernter, machine

beautythe union of power and simplicity in
innovationis key to developing software that helps users
break free from the confines of a machines internal logic
towards a creative symbiosis between the user and her
activity [5]. A loss of awareness of the structure and
1

Photo from Kunkel, P. Digital Dreams: The Work of the

Sony Design Center, p. 16-17.

One example is the Apple Macintosh interface (Figure

2). Gelernter extols the disciplined visual richness of the
desktop metaphor with an abstract yet functional icon
system to easily afford tasks like writing, playing, or
reading [5]. The Macintosh interface is comprehensible and
usable by non-technically savvy users who seek a pleasant
computing experience.
Likewise, the Apple Pro Mouse (Figure 3) has an
elegant, useful forma single uniform shell that is the sole
button for interacting with the interface. The shell bears a
responsive fit to the users hand, with a deft pivot action
that affords a satisfying transparency of use [4].

Figure 3: The Apple Pro Mouse (Photo by author)

Showtime and Spiritual Appeals

There is yet another example of beauty in action worth

exploring, in which the product shapes human spirit. There
may be designs that contribute to ones sense of individual
worth and perhaps even cultural, or spiritual affinity. The
user may feel like a member of a community that elevates
what has been experienced into something personally
intimate yet relating to a collective whole.

The Showtime kinetic brand (Figure 4) stimulates the

viewer with movements of type, color, and dramatic
photography to convey the idea of no limits, the cable
companys tag line. There is an emotional power in the
coordination of visual elements reinforced by stirring
music. The type movements suggest cyclical and
transformational energy, while the shadowy imagery
highlighted by fiery elements create a haunting sense of
aspiration towards no limits [4].

CONCLUSION

Interaction designers should be concerned with the issue of

beauty as our environment of experience becomes rapidly
shaped by digital, networked, multifunctional artifacts that
influence our lifestyles and perceptions.
I have outlined viewpoints and examples of beauty to help
designers define user experience in terms of legitimate,
positive aesthetic values. The language of Dewey and
Santayana, as reflected in the examples, reveal how usercentered processes may incorporate such thinking in
creating products whose interactive potential moves a
person emotionally and physically to yield a memorable
moment worth re-living and sharing.
There are other issues to consider: How can we predict or
measure emotional response? How can we intuit heuristics
for ostensibly beautiful designs? Cognitive studies into
attention and attraction (perhaps with guidance from social
psychology) and metrics of experiential quality may also
help in understanding beauty in design.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Figure 4: Showtime Kinetic Branding2

The brand mark invites the viewer to return and participate
in Showtimes media environment of fresh, bold content
with others who share a common ambition to transcend the
limits of ordinary television. Thus, the mark identifies a
particular media culture and asks the viewer to join through
sensorial appeals to certain human aspirations she may
share with Showtime [4].
Extending the Theme

This last example suggests greater issues of cultural

connectedness and the theme of attention, attraction, and
beauty operating as communication, unification, and
participation [4]. A pleasurable emotional value derived
from sensuous interaction may lead to a communication
that speaks to ones central motive for lifeperhaps related
to what Joseph Campbell describes as the experience of
being alive emotionally, spiritually, and culturally [1].
For instance, one may value an ideal she has always
wanted to express but could not. However, she may find a
remarkable expression that embodies exactly that, manifest
in a memorable user experience. This leads to an
inspirational feeling that encourages someone to become an
active participant in society to further cultivate and spread
those values [4].

Photo from Curran, S. Motion Graphics: Graphic

Design for Broadcast and Film. Rockport Publishers,
March 2000. pg. 9.

I would like to thank Richard Buchanan, of Carnegie

Mellons School of Design, for his encouragement in
investigating this topic, and my colleagues at Oracle for
their editorial feedback.
REFERENCES

1. Campbell, J. The Power of Myth. New York, NY:

Anchor Books, 1988.
2. Dewey, J. Art as Experience. New York, NY: Perigee
Books, (reprint) 1980.
3. Forlizzi, J. and Ford, S. The building blocks of
experience: An early framework for interaction
designers. Proceedings of the DIS00 Conference.
Brooklyn, NY, 2000.
4. Gajendar, U. Design for beauty: Exploring the human
experience of interaction design. Master's Thesis.
School of Design, Carnegie Mellon University, 2001.
5. Gelernter, D. Machine Beauty: Elegance and the Heart
of Technology. New York, NY: Basic Books, 1998.
6. Kunkel, P. Digital Dreams: The Work of the Sony
Design Center. New York, NY: Universe, 1999.
7. Norman, D. The Invisible Computer. MIT Press, 1999.
8. Pine and Gilmore. The Experience Economy. Boston,
MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1999.
9. Santayana, G. The Sense of Beauty: Being the Outline
of Aesthetic Theory. New York, NY: Dover, 1955.