During this lecture we talked a lot about user experience and also universal user experience. We also discussed what it means that something is usable. Is usable really such a positive word? Of course I really would like the product I just bought to be usable, if in fact that is what I bought it for. But usable feels like it is something that I should be able to take for granted. So it would be better if companies instead marketed their product saying something more specific, it’s easy to learn, it makes you more effective, you will feel happy while you use this product, etc.
Another subject we briefly discussed was something called affective interaction, more specifically how a product makes the user feel. When I thought about this my mind immediately went to the psychological effects of colors. If these could be integrated into the design of a product, for the general public or for people with impairments, it would probably have a really good effect. For example some studies shows that students exposed to the color red prior to an exam actually performed worse on said exam than other students, so this color should probably be avoided on an impairment aid used during exams or other mental activities. Though the color red did cause test subjects to react with greater speed and performance, so some users may benefit on having a red product in some cases and in some cases it should be avoided at all costs. I think that colors, and of course design, can also help in making some products less stigmatizing to use for people with certain impairments.
Info on color psychology: http://psychology.about.com/od/sensationandperception/a/colorpsych.htm
Non-excluding Design 