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The Computer Journal Advance Access originally published online on January 10, 2008
The Computer Journal 2008 51(6):650-661; doi:10.1093/comjnl/bxm102
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The British Computer Society. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Affordance and Symmetry in User Interfaces

Paul Cairns1,* and Harold Thimbleby2

1 Deptartment of Computer Science, University of York, York, YO10 5DD, UK
2 Department of Computer Science, Swansea University, Swansea, SA2, 8PP, UK

* Corresponding author: pcairns{at}cs.york.ac.uk

Received 20 December 2006; revised 5 November 2007

Affordance is a widely used term in human–computer interaction (HCI) that, while familiar and attractive, does not have a clear operational definition. Using the mathematical concept of symmetry, this paper shows that it is possible to begin developing an operational definition for significant aspects of affordance by forming the theoretical concept of symmetry-affordance. The proposed definition restricts symmetry-affordance to particular contexts but in doing so makes it more useful, as it is clear how to exploit symmetry to aid design. The definition is in standard mathematics (in fact, group theory and model theory) and requires little additional structure. In examining symmetry-affordance, it becomes clear that some other HCI notions can be similarly interpreted by symmetry. The paper provides examples and design insights.

Symmetry, as wide or as narrow as you may define its meaning, is one idea by which man through the ages has tried to comprehend and create order, beauty, and perfection. Hermann Weyl [(1952) Symmetry, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ]

Key Words: affordance • consistency • mode • symmetry • HCI


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