Back to School!

I received an acceptance letter today for U of Washington's program in Human Centered Design and Engineering. I am starting in January, and I am excited.

Although there is great potential for this to change, the plan is to incorporate the HCDE concepts (usability, interface design, human factors, etc) with my background in movement science to improve interfaces in healthcare and healthy living. This, in my opinion, is a very exciting application of the field for a few reasons:

1. Persuasive Technologies. If websites, mobile devices and interfaces are going to motivate people to be healthy, they have to be really persuasive. So far, I haven't really found a single interface relating to coaching that is persuasive and enjoyable to interact with. I've tried Training Peaks, Workout Log, and everything in between, but all of them are missing that persuasive factor, or the ability to engage users. Thus, I have to bug people constantly to update training peaks.

2. Culturally Sensitive Care. This applies mostly to healthcare. Definitions of sickness and health are very different across cultures (Read The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down). Misunderstanding these differences can be very destructive to a patient's care, which is why it's important that any healthcare interface that the patient may see is sensitive to these factors. This applies to design of the office, how sensitive materials are presented, and explanations of disease (you know, those handouts they give you on what your injury or sickness is). The HCDE program is really focused on the user, and this is especially important here.

Don't even get me started on the terrible interfaces I deal with on a daily basis, such as everything made by Powertap.

I need to do more thinking to figure out exactly what direction I want to go with this. The program is broad, so I have to narrow my focus on something. Usability, instructional design, interface design, and human factors are the most interesting to me.

Erin is on a military boat with my dad until tomorrow night with no way to contact him. It is weird finding out this news when I can't tell him or celebrate with him.

In other news, my hip still hurts and I am still waiting to see the doctor.