Mo.De. - Motivational Design: the four core elements

Mo.De. Motivational Design

In summary, what are social networks? They are networks of people. Network: complex systems. People: psychological and social dynamics.

We need to think differently about social networks. Technology enables usage but that's not enough: the dynamics interplay on the interfaces, which are considered social artefacts in addition to being cognitive.

Why do we need motivations in design? It’s because if we consider systemic factors as constraints and opportunities, the motivations are what fuel social networks and make them running, growing and living entities.

The four pillars of Motivational Design: 1. Functional Needs 2. Social Usability 3. Relational Motivations 4. Circadian Activity Flow

Opening a channel isn’t enough to make people participate. ﬂickr • 11164872@N04

The Functional Needs: Needs and requirements of the person and/or group that are satisﬁed explicitly by the system.

The Motivation: Dynamic factor of animal and human behavior that activates and directs toward an objective.

The Relational Motivations: 1. Competition 2. Excellence 3. Curiosity 4. Affection

The Relational Motivations: competition. The need to impose oneself and/or his/hers beliefs. The search for a confrontation. The accumulation of aggressiveness. Anger - Aggressivity system

Example Digg: no more charts Digg was forced to remove the “Top Diggers” chart. The reason? Top diggers were accused of manipulating results to be quot;at the topquot; and Digg perceived this as ruining the quality of the service. http://blog.digg.com/?p=60

The Relational Motivations: excellence. The need to conﬁrm one's skills and quality self-worth. The need for approval and increase one's self-esteem. Narcissism - Self

Example Digg: the voting system Digg’s voting design is very simple and fast: one click and you decide if the content is good. Note: while it isn’t clear at ﬁrst glance, the “vote down” feature exists as well. It’s just harder to reach and use. Digg has a “hybrid” voting design: two votes are possible, but one is deﬁnitely easier.

The Relational Motivations: curiosity. The need for knowledge and control. The need to satisfy one's exploratory instinct. Research - Play system

Example FFFFOUND! arouses curiosity FFFFOUND! is a service focused on continual visual creativity stimulation. It associates images and people together in order to make afﬁnities and ideas emerge.

The Relational Motivations: affection. The need to share and be a part of a community or relationship that supports individual actions and thoughts, that also functions as a shelter to protect oneself. Affection - Care system

Example LinkedIn: implicit and explicit On LinkedIn groups and recommendations are used to raise one’s status. Groups are used to display a sort of “social identiﬁcation badge” . Recommendations play a role of reciprocal acknowledgment.

Social is overrated. ﬂickr • luc

Social Usability. Social Usability is a quality attribute that assesses how easy social interactions are to make. The word “social usability” also refers to the methods for improving the ease of human-human interactions during the design process.

Social Usability properties: interpersonal relations. How easy is it to ﬁnd other people and connect to them? How easy is it to keep those connections active? How relevant are those connections?

Example FriendFeed: subtle contacts FriendFeed designed an interesting method to allow people to discover other people in a content-driven situation. It shows you a speciﬁc content of someone you don’t follow if a friend comments on it.

Social Usability properties: identity. How rich is one's personal identity expression? How much are interests and passions expressed? How much are personal distinctive traits shown?

Example Facebook: proﬁles Facebook, as a generic social network (a social network without any other scope outside social relations) is the best example of a 360° proﬁle. Note: it’s curious that the page theme is one of the few things that isn’t possible to customize, it’s a kind of personalization that allows a very good identity expression at a glance.

Social Usability properties communication. How fast can a message reach the other person? How many messages can one handle efﬁciently? How easy is it to handle conversations (1-to-1, 1-to- some, 1-to-many)?

Example Skype: with one, or many Skype is a software that allows very ﬂexible and lightweight communication channel management: personal 1-to-1, private 1-to- some and public 1-to-many. All of these with just a click. This is true for both text and voice (and ﬁle exchange).

Social Usability properties: groups emergence. How easy is it to create groups, aggregate and talk around a common interest? How active are groups once estabilished? How long do they last? How important is to be a part of the group?

Example IRC: a new group is simple This is an old friend. IRC is centered on the room metaphor, that’s just a way to organize groups. A new group is just a few clicks away. The IRC rooms: real time interactions and a name can easily build strong relationships.

Circadian Activity Flow. It’s the sequence of small and big actions made during the span of a day, prioritized through competing individual value hierarchies: importance, interest, obligations, easiness, moral, etc.

Example Twitter: always, everywhere Twitter is a leader of insertion ins one’s ﬂow, thanks to a wide array of channels to use it: web, e- mail, instant messaging, sms. Anything not offered by Twitter directly is created by outsiders through the API.

Doubts? Questions? Comments? ﬂickr • jay_que

Gianandrea Giacoma ibridazioni.com gianandrea.giacoma@gmail.com Davide Casali intenseminimalism.com folletto@gmail.com Better Software Florence, 6-7th of may, 2009 bettersoftware.it ﬂickr • dharmesh84

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Mo.De. - Motivational Design: the four core elements

by Davide 'Folletto' Casali

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