In design thinking, affordances are those functions which a tool immediately presents as an option to users. For a hammer or screwdriver, the grips are self-evident while the business ends afford at least a guess at what the device could be used for. A blunt, metal end urges our minds to smash (so much so that “hammer” eventually became the operational verb of this act in symbiosis with early stone-headed tools). A pointy, grooved end leads us to look for a place to insert its pattern while the octagonal grip insinuates a turning motion with the holding wrist.
Affordance are everywhere. Door handles that say “push” or imply “pull.” Indentations on keys that are satisfyingly discovered to be buttons when clicked. These work in tandem with the human body to allow us to function without thought.
The digital world uses transposed design language to communicate its affordances. Swiping pages like a book, receiving haptic feedback from clicking icons, double-tapping things we like (which feels neatly gamified in its insidious simplicity). For fifteen years, our minds have slowly adjusted themselves to the point of rewriting our ability to interact with those analog tools like the hammer. The disappearance of shop class and the rise of the “knowledge worker” betoken a clear shift in priorities.
The issue arises when we try to ask, what does a smartphone afford? Said with zero hyperbole: everything.
A phone is meant to be a communication device. We downsized landline and rotary phones over decades to allow portability for our more urgent conversations. But these became something else. Maybe we took all our smart and put it into the phone, leaving you and I with…
Upon your very first start-up, smartphones present more than a few things. Messages, calls, maps, forecasts, internet, cameras, movies, and games. Jump into the app store and welcome to infinity. Decision fatigue, analysis paralysis, option inundation- these become our water, pings, notification symbols, and vibrations become our air within which we (dry) drown.
Were we ever meant to have this many affordances at the swipe of a finger? Would we expect affordances like these to prompt anything but the chaos, polarization, toxicity, inattention, and unrest we have today? Are we intent on lagging behind the intelligence of our devices in this incessant off-loading process?
Should we instill our phones with wisdom as we uninstall our intelligence, or should we create more tools whose affordances respect our anthropology and restrain our god complex?
