Chris Dickman (bio)

I say brave because we've increasingly moved away from the position that humans are somehow knowable in an absolute way, even within a particular time, place and culture, let alone universally. The certainties of the early psychologists have evolved to embrace a more nuanced approach to what it is to be human, thank goodness. Even such a long-accepted master in the art of defining the essence of humanity, Sigmund Freud, has in recent years begun to be re-evaluated as more properly positioned in the philosophical tradition, rather than that of a scientist who "discovered" fundamental, universal truths about human nature.

This is the central thesis of the recent work of French author Michel Onfray, The Twilight of an Idol (not yet available in English), who convincingly demonstrates that Freud's "universal" principles of psychoanalysis, which still so entangle Western thinking about human nature, not only were drawn from his personal experiences but actually serve only to explain his own impressively large litany of quirks. This impulse to see the universal in the personal, the all-compassing in the tiny sample, is of course not confined to psychoanalysis, or even the sciences, but can be found within practically all disciplines.

If I sound a note of caution about the central thesis of this book, it's simply to temper the faith placed in "experts" by the original author and those who participated in the revised edition. The latter state that: "The concepts in this book, broadly referred to as 'principles,' consist of laws, guidelines, human biases, and general design considerations. The principles were selected from a variety of design disciples based on several factors, including utility, degree of misuse or misunderstanding, and strength of supporting evidence." The two last words are really the key to whether what's presented is simply mildly interesting speculation or well-grounded assertion on which you can confidently take action.

So it's up to you to follow up on the citations and decide for yourself whether high ceilings promote creativity, while low ones promote concrete and detail-oriented thinking (Cathedral Effect). Or if anthropomorphic forms are appealing when they are dissimilar or identical to humans, but unappealing when they are very similar to humans (Uncanny Valley). Plausible enough. Could be. But how about a tendency to perceive women wearing red as more attractive and men wearing red as more dominant (Red Effect)? I forwarded that item to Lady Gaga for comment.

So while blind faith in the "universality" of the 125 principles is perhaps unwise, they nevertheless add up to an interesting read and can serve as the introduction to new lines of thought, which is always a good thing. Although I wish they'd updated more of the example imagery: employing a screen shot of the pre-OS X Mac interface is a trip down memory lane, as is showing signup CDs for AOL. Some things are best left forgotten.

You can decide for yourself by checking out an extract of the Universal Principles of Design on Graphics.com, which includes the Baby-Face Bias (shown above), Biophilia Effect, Cathedral Effect and Chunking principles.

Chris Dickman
Graphics.com