How does a triangle become a circle? Why is there no golden section? Why do people reject logic?
In the 1930s, the Soviet scientist A.R. Luria made an expedition to the villages and camps of the nomads of Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. They observed the form and content of the people who lived there, who either had minimal education or were completely illiterate. Accordingly, they were dominated by forms of thinking that arose from the elementary forms of activity and characteristics of familiar objects.
One of the practical experiments was this. The subjects were asked to group similar figures:
')
Mostly illiterate people gave the figures the names familiar from their own lives. They saw in this picture a plate, a tent, a bracelet, beads, etc. The more literate subjects mostly gave geometrical names to the figures.
It is interesting for us how the illiterate test subjects were grouped together. For them, 2 and 7 were considered similar, since both were “window frames”, and 6 and 4 were hours. 3, 1 and 5 had no similarity between themselves. Moreover, these people categorically rejected the experimenters' statements of similarity, for example, 1 and 3. “They are not at all similar. The first is a coin, and the second is the moon. ”
What can be learned from this for design, as well as about another experiment in which people completely deny logic, read as much as two of my notes here:
nordisk.pp.ru/design/47
nordisk.pp.ru/design/49
Or shortened compilation under the cut
So, first of all, Luria proves that there are no “universal laws of perception” that some psychologists talk about, and which some modern designers are looking for. That is, the "golden section" - the concept is still subjective and results from experience, rather than it has a biologically explicable nature. Categorical perception of objects, such as perception of form, reflects the historically established and inherited way of classifying objects in the world around us. If you place a person from birth in an incubator, where it will not be possible to find generally recognized harmonious proportions in any object, there will be no golden section for him.
Secondly, a modern designer should always take into account the type of activity, accumulated experience and educational level of the audience for which his product is intended. Otherwise, by making some categorical judgments of their own, which would otherwise be interpreted by consumers, the designer runs the risk of either being misunderstood or completely misunderstood and rejected. In my post about Chernov’s Faces, some of the readers saw data not encoded as faces, but ... uh ... faces. Well, simply because every day they look at people, and not engaged in analytical work. Other commentators tried to logically convince the first, but they did not succeed. Similarly, in the experiment of Luria, non-users of geometry did not see geometrical similarities and did not recognize the logic that would convince them of this.
Finally, thirdly, it seems to me that about the same mechanisms are based on many people arguing about design. Luria's group conducted another experiment. They offered people, whose whole experience was reduced to daily work in the field, to draw conclusions from simple syllogisms like:
- Cotton grows where it is hot and dry.
- In England, cold and damp.
- Can cotton grow there or not?
The Uzbeks did not see absolutely any logic in this issue. They refused to make a judgment that could not be supported by their personal experience. We must go to England to know whether cotton can grow there, they said. No convictions of experimenters, pushing the answer and repeated repetitions of the statement simply did not work.
Roughly speaking, when a customer asks “to add red one,” he as an “Uzbek” is based on his experience. The designer is horrified and tries to correct the customer’s thinking with thousands of logical and reasonable arguments, but he simply does not understand or rejects his logic, because it contradicts his experience. Well, or vice versa :)
It would be interesting to read about ways to overcome such stupor. For example, “having formed an illiterate Uzbek” - telling the customer about the reasons for his experience - one could “elevate” him to the next level so that he understood the logic of the designer and could make a choice. Here is my discussion with the designer on this topic:
users.livejournal.com/_anti/84165.html
In total, Luria touches on a large and important topic that can be developed very fruitfully for a long time. Thanks to those who pushed through all the number of my letters :)
As a prize, here is a link to the full version of Luria's article.
www.intellectus.su/lib/00012.htm
One of the practical experiments was this. The subjects were asked to group similar figures:
')
Mostly illiterate people gave the figures the names familiar from their own lives. They saw in this picture a plate, a tent, a bracelet, beads, etc. The more literate subjects mostly gave geometrical names to the figures.
It is interesting for us how the illiterate test subjects were grouped together. For them, 2 and 7 were considered similar, since both were “window frames”, and 6 and 4 were hours. 3, 1 and 5 had no similarity between themselves. Moreover, these people categorically rejected the experimenters' statements of similarity, for example, 1 and 3. “They are not at all similar. The first is a coin, and the second is the moon. ”
What can be learned from this for design, as well as about another experiment in which people completely deny logic, read as much as two of my notes here:
nordisk.pp.ru/design/47
nordisk.pp.ru/design/49
Or shortened compilation under the cut
So, first of all, Luria proves that there are no “universal laws of perception” that some psychologists talk about, and which some modern designers are looking for. That is, the "golden section" - the concept is still subjective and results from experience, rather than it has a biologically explicable nature. Categorical perception of objects, such as perception of form, reflects the historically established and inherited way of classifying objects in the world around us. If you place a person from birth in an incubator, where it will not be possible to find generally recognized harmonious proportions in any object, there will be no golden section for him.
Secondly, a modern designer should always take into account the type of activity, accumulated experience and educational level of the audience for which his product is intended. Otherwise, by making some categorical judgments of their own, which would otherwise be interpreted by consumers, the designer runs the risk of either being misunderstood or completely misunderstood and rejected. In my post about Chernov’s Faces, some of the readers saw data not encoded as faces, but ... uh ... faces. Well, simply because every day they look at people, and not engaged in analytical work. Other commentators tried to logically convince the first, but they did not succeed. Similarly, in the experiment of Luria, non-users of geometry did not see geometrical similarities and did not recognize the logic that would convince them of this.
Finally, thirdly, it seems to me that about the same mechanisms are based on many people arguing about design. Luria's group conducted another experiment. They offered people, whose whole experience was reduced to daily work in the field, to draw conclusions from simple syllogisms like:
- Cotton grows where it is hot and dry.
- In England, cold and damp.
- Can cotton grow there or not?
The Uzbeks did not see absolutely any logic in this issue. They refused to make a judgment that could not be supported by their personal experience. We must go to England to know whether cotton can grow there, they said. No convictions of experimenters, pushing the answer and repeated repetitions of the statement simply did not work.
Roughly speaking, when a customer asks “to add red one,” he as an “Uzbek” is based on his experience. The designer is horrified and tries to correct the customer’s thinking with thousands of logical and reasonable arguments, but he simply does not understand or rejects his logic, because it contradicts his experience. Well, or vice versa :)
It would be interesting to read about ways to overcome such stupor. For example, “having formed an illiterate Uzbek” - telling the customer about the reasons for his experience - one could “elevate” him to the next level so that he understood the logic of the designer and could make a choice. Here is my discussion with the designer on this topic:
users.livejournal.com/_anti/84165.html
In total, Luria touches on a large and important topic that can be developed very fruitfully for a long time. Thanks to those who pushed through all the number of my letters :)
As a prize, here is a link to the full version of Luria's article.
www.intellectus.su/lib/00012.htm
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/54833/
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