Who doesn't know the scene in the film The Matrix where the protagonist Thomas A. Anderson (Neo) realises that the reality he believes to be 'real' is a computer-generated construction of which he himself is a part?
Or in Total Recall (1990 version), where Quaid is confronted with the possibility that what he is experiencing may be based on a ‘memory implant’, i.e. is not actually 'experienced' at all?
Or the scene in Vanilla Sky where David Aames realises that he has been living in an artificially created ‘reality’ for a long time?
In all these films (and the underlying books), they raise questions such as:
- Is the reality we experience truly real?
- How can we be so sure?
- And if there are several subjective realities, which one do we want to live in?
In The Matrix, Neo has to choose between the blue and the red pill, and also Quaid and David Aames have to decide what they consider to be real and which reality they want to live in. The red pill stood for the possibility of seeing reality as it really is. The blue pill, on the other hand, stood for the decision to remain in the comfortable illusion and accept it as “normal reality”.
How real is reality?
I had a similar experience when I read Paul Watzlawick's book «How Real Is Real?», Watzlawick argues convincingly that our reality is always a construction of our mind, indirectly asking whether there is a world outside our consciousness at all, or whether the world only exists through our consciousness?
In fact, our experienced reality is ‘constituted’ by our perception. Our experienced reality is only “constructed” through our perception. Much of the information we receive through our senses is first filtered out. Our brain makes the selection rather quickly, without involving our consciousness - this is known as preattentive processing. The remaining units of information are heavily adapted before they are transported into our consciousness, enriched with prior knowledge, hypothetical assumptions, and generalizations, where they are further interpreted.
Therefore, a User Experience - in fact, every experience we have - is a construction of our cognition. There is a lot of evidence for this, which I discuss here on this website.
Why this matters for User Experience
Especially as UX designers, a certain humility and modesty about what we think we “know” can be extremely helpful. It is important to continually question our own assumptions and beliefs, because they are inherently subjective and susceptible to self-deception and distortion. Nothing we take for “given” is objectively “true” – everything is a product of perception, communication, conventions, and beliefs.
However, by gaining a better understanding of these interrelationships and underlying principles, we are in a much stronger position to design solutions that are truly user-centered and effective.
On this website, I describe around 70 phenomena and insights that, in my view, have a significant impact on the User Experience of the things we encounter in our daily lives. The selection is subjective, but it certainly covers the most important findings from cognitive science that are relevant for UX/UI designers. This site is by no means set in stone – more topics may be added over time. And of course, I’m always open to suggestions and ideas!
About me
My name is Thomas Sokolowski. I studied Visual Communication at the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Hildesheim/Holzminden. Today, I work as a Senior UX Designer at a digital agency in Zurich.
Professionally, I have been working intensively with inclusion and accessibility for some time now and have realized how subjective our reality is, especially when working with people who lack certain senses or who cognitively perceive differently than the ‘normative average‘.
My exploration of what actually happens cognitively when we read or perceive something with our senses, and how design influences our brain, led me to create this website. I apply many of the principles listed here in my daily work as a UX designer.
If you’d like to contact me, please feel free to do so at [email protected]. You can also find my LinkedIn profile in the footer, which you can use to get in touch with me.