Adaptive Path Blog

When it comes to thinking about the true cost of things, ignorance is bliss. People prefer that costs be hidden:

• It feels cheaper to drive to work than to take transit. You see the money leave your pocket for every transit trip. But the annual thousand-dollar insurance bill and depreciation of your car are more easily forgotten.
• It feels better to have taxes invisibly withheld than to write regular checks to the IRS and come face-to-face with the taxes you’re paying.
• It feels better to get “free parking!“ at your apartment or local grocery store than to pay for parking, even if it might mean lower everyday prices.

Now with a little thinking you can calculate the true monetary costs of many things. But environmental and social costs are even more elusive.

Hidden costs lead to a breakdown of capitalism. People are unable to make optimal decisions because they don’t consider the true costs of things. It’s easy to see a price tag, but it is difficult to take into account all of the factors that make up something’s true cost.

How can hidden costs be made visible? An obvious solution is to pass the financial burden on to the consumer.

• Charging for plastic bags (IKEA)
• Transferring the full cost of oil to consumers

Unfortunately, while taking advantage of market forces, these measures also tend to make people grouchy.

Jennie Winhall’s talk at MX on Designing for Social Good has made me think about ways that we, as user experience designers, could use our understanding of psychology and behavior to develop creative and positive solutions that help people see hidden costs and make better decisions. Some examples…

Grouchy experience: Big warning sign featuring fines you’ll receive if you dump toxic waste into a storm drain.
Positive experience: Design storm drains to look like fish. You wouldn’t want to dump junk on a cute fish.

Grouchy experience: A taxi-like money ticker that shows you how much every trip in your car is really costing — in real time!
Positive experience: A taxi-like money ticker that shows you how much you’re saving when you drive more slowly and that turns fuel and money-saving into a game. (”One important reason why hybrid cars result in better mileage is that drivers suddenly have an indication of how various aspects of their driving habits shape mileage.” -Jamaias Cascio)

Other ideas?

But I’ll end with a caveat that experience isn’t everything when it comes to hidden costs. Sometimes facing reality will make us uncomfortable, and that’s not always bad.

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This entry was posted on Friday, February 23rd, 2007 at 2:45 am and is filed under Experience design, Interaction Design, Product Design, Service Design, Sustainability. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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