How to Create Intuitive Products by Imitating Physicality

Suited For: Intermediate to Advanced
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Closes in
22
56
24
95 % booked

In This Course, You'll

  • Get excited about designing products people instantly find familiar and understand because they tap into a lifetime of physical experience. Our brains evolved for a world of weight, texture, and space, and we make sense of anything new through the physical experience we already carry. In this course, design legend and professor Alan Dix teaches you to make products and devices feel natural by designing for physicality across the four things that shape every interaction. These are the artifacts you hold, the space around you, your own body, and the digital objects you create. Think of a simple light switch that you can tell is on or off just by touching it. It reveals what modern touchscreens take away. When you design that certainty back in, your users can lean on their physical instincts, rather than guess at what the screen is doing. You already know rules and expectations like this in your gut; you bring them to every product you touch without realizing it. You'll put those instincts into the open so you can name what's breaking in an interaction, and get the tools to design experiences, whether physical, digital, or a mix of both, that match your users' deepest intuitions.
  • Make yourself invaluable when you can turn the way we navigate the physical world into a working method for digital design. You'll learn Dix's physigrams (a simple notation for mapping how a device physically behaves) so you can catch and fix the kinds of interaction problems that only surface when the user's attention is elsewhere, such as when driving or walking. With the three rules of physicality that digital technology routinely breaks, you'll be able to pinpoint exactly where your product will confuse people and where to design reassurance back in. You'll explore the multiple feedback loops that link an action to its result, from the direct feel of a button to the simulated click an interface fakes, so you can diagnose why an interaction feels wrong. AI can generate a digital interface in seconds, but it has no body. It has never felt for that switch in the dark, and it can't always judge what a digital interface should feel like to a human. As AI accelerates the way we design, that judgment and how to build for people are timeless, human-centered design skills that keep you irreplaceable.
  • Gain confidence and credibility as you evaluate, critique, and defend design choices by tracing them back to the way the physical world taught us to expect things to behave. Space and the body are part of the design too, and you'll discover examples such as why a screen's size decides whether one person or a group gathers around it, and why switching between two emotionally charged chats feels so jarring. You'll even read continuity the way children and fairy tales reveal it to discover which physical rules we'll happily bend, and which we won't. This breadth lets you work on any product, whether you're optimizing an existing one or designing your own. You'll finish able to pick up any product, on a screen, in your hand, or somewhere in between, and say with authority what works, what doesn't, and why.

Learn From Industry Leaders

Master complex skills with proven best practices and toolkits directly from industry leaders. Meet your expert for this course:

  • Alan Dix: Author of the bestselling book “Human-Computer Interaction” and Director of the Computational Foundry at Swansea University.

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Earn Industry-Recognized Certificates

Industry giants trust our courses to train their teams, and prestigious universities integrate our content into their curricula. Add your certificates to your LinkedIn profile, résumé, and job applications.

Our clients: IBM, Harvard University, University of Cambridge, NASA, Adobe, Stanford, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, LinkedIn
Course Certificate Example

Is This Course Right for You?

  • You want an evidence-based curriculum taught by industry leaders.
  • You want real-world design skills that translate directly into professional practice.
  • You want to earn industry-recognized credentials.
  • Your time is too valuable for scattered free content with no structure.
  • You want learning that leads to better roles and stronger earning potential over time.
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Loved by People Around the World

View full testimonial from Ana Rajner
Ana Rajner
Ana Rajner
ux anthropologist

I love it. And Alan is so great. It is my first time to take his course, but I will dig for more of his courses. He takes so simple examples...

Certificate
View full testimonial from Jenny Vogel
Jenny Vogel
Jenny Vogel
Product Designer

I loved his storytelling and examples! At first, I did think the videos were a bit long, and maybe even a little bit of repetitive info, but...

IxDF Course Certificate awarded to Jenny Vogel for completing the "How to Create Intuitive Products by Imitating Physicality" course

How It Works

  1. Build High-Impact AI and Design Skills

    Industry leaders from companies like Adobe, Google, and NASA teach you real-world skills grounded in industry practice and research.

  2. Combine AI and Timeless Design Skills

    Learn both AI and the human-centered design skills that AI can't replace.

  3. Earn Industry-Recognized Certificates

    Add IxDF Course Certificates to your LinkedIn profile and résumé to show you've completed an evidence-based curriculum taught by industry leaders.

  4. Turn Your Skills Into Career Opportunities

    Use your new skills to take on higher-value work, qualify for promotions or find a role that fits you better.

  5. Build a Network That Supports Your Career

    Connect with designers in 496 cities across 107 countries. Learn together, get mentored, and build relationships that open doors.

Course Overview

  • Each week, one lesson becomes available.
  • Study flexibly. Take as much time as you want.
  • 7.5 hours / 24 lesson items in 5 lessons.

What's Inside IxDF Membership?

  • High-impact design and AI skills

  • Learn from 209 industry leaders

  • 42 evidence-based courses

  • 161 one-hour Master Classes

  • Industry-recognized certificates

  • $2,189 worth of toolkits

  • 11,144 active design jobs

  • 10 structured career programs

  • Global community in 496 cities

  • $6,649 worth of premium tools

  • 276 ready-made templates

  • and much more

Start Today

Risk-free: 14-day money-back guarantee

Suited For: Intermediate to Advanced
G2 Logo 5 Stars Google Logo 5 Stars
Closes in
22
56
24
95 % booked

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Pierleone Loreti
Pierleone Loreti
Product designer

Thanks for this course: I find it really stimulating and it gives lots of insights in what human expects from machines and objects.

Ana Rajner
Ana Rajner
ux anthropologist

I love it. And Alan is so great. It is my first time to take his course, but I will dig for more of his courses. He takes so simple examples, but explains a lot. Thank you IDF for this experience.

Michael Scharber
Michael Scharber
Data Designer & Information Architect

The instructor (Alan Dix) is animated, clear, engaging and entertaining.

Laura Ardelean
Laura Ardelean
UX Designer

The content was presented in a very natural way and I felt like a student participating in a modern class about design. I loved the teaching by showing approach, the fact that brought basic objects to help explain some abstract concepts.

Elesha Vartak
Elesha Vartak
Student

Alan's explanations are organic conversations, making it easy to understand the topic.

Dhiresh Patel
Dhiresh Patel
User Experience Architect

I think the instructor was very engaging, and his delivery kept me interested.

Jenny Vogel
Jenny Vogel
Product Designer

I loved his storytelling and examples! At first, I did think the videos were a bit long, and maybe even a little bit of repetitive info, but I realized through the course it was really starting to sink in. I loved the thought provoking questions and the openness of them. I feel like the grading was nice to see right away so I could understand if I was answering them correctly or needed to improve my essay answers in some way.