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Essay Unit 10 - Human-computer Interaction - Impact of HCI
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Detailed explanation of the Impact of HCI
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The Impact of HCIHCI stands for Human Computer Interaction. It is the way we interact with computers through
mediums of input such as mouse and keyboard or touchscreens. We use HCI often in our day to
day life, things like self service checkouts are an example of HCI.
Over the last 20 years HCI has come a long way, computers were slowly introduced into
business but even so were rarely offered to the public to use. The first kind of HCI came with the
introduction of GUI to computer systems. This allowed the human to actually interact with the
computer rather than simply restrict the users to those who knew all the commands.
The impact of GUI was the real turning point in the popularity of the computer, within society it
became easier to learn to use computers because they now required much less skill to operate.
In the last decade specifically the popularity of computers has skyrocketed with smartphones.
They have begun to revolutionize the way the public perceive technology, less now with fear and
more with confidence. UI designers are coming up with better ways to introduce new technology
to the public and the study of HCI has enabled this.
The way HCI is performed has also changed a lot, it was once the case that everyone could
only use the keyboards to interact with computers, now the options are much wider. People can
use voice recognition to interact with computers, people with disabilities can use technology
using their eyes or toes or whatever they can, people have been developing all sorts of ways for
all kinds of people to be able to interact with computers.
Culture was greatly impacted by technology also, becoming more fashionable to own certain
brands of technology. We can see with companies like Apple who have marketed their mobile
devices like a fashion company, strengthening their brand so much it’s universally recognised.
This individual piece of technology has a culture of it’s own, whole collectives of people
identified by the type of mobile phone they have, whether they own a macbook or Windows PC.
The other big influence on culture has been social media, things like Facebook and Twitter have
become the normal method of communication, people no longer need to remember numbers to
call their friends, they just need to know their name. Media is now streamed over the internet
through services like Netflix and Amazon and YouTube and they are building up so much traffic
these days they’re being heralded as the new TV. Not only is it easier to choose what you
watch, but the options for where you watch it are limitless, whether it be on a smartphone, tablet
or laptop, people can view online media whenever and wherever. Some might argue that the
influence it’s had on culture has been negative, making people more antisocial and more
distracted in their day to day lives.
Finally then, the influence HCI has had on the economy has been rather large, things like
productivity have soared since the introduction of technology in common business, something
that likely wouldn’t have happened had GUI’s never come about, people were finding
computer’s easier to use and thus began to use them more. As well as in small offices, big
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