As a Scandinavian, it’s easy to get stuck in your European opinion of what visually user-friendly design is — stripped-down, bright, modern. And so the important question here is — what do we miss when we forget to design for a larger cross-section of humanity?
As globalization increases, our world is becoming smaller and smaller. This is nothing new. Businesses expand across major markets, and with this comes new challenges in how we design for our customers and users. But it’s not just that businesses reach a larger audience online; the fact is that the audience itself is also growing. A large part of humanity that has previously been excluded from digital development is now going online. This entails completely different types of challenges for groups of users who might prefer to interact (and does so better) via images, videos, speech, or other similar formats, rather than mostly text-based media.
So as a designer, how can you design for a global audience while also showing consideration for cultural and local differences?
Culture is not geography; it’s a way of life
We can start by pointing out that acknowledging different cultures requires different approaches. So how do these differences affect our design perspective? Naturally, designing for geographically diverse target groups is about more than just changing languages and exchanging currency — many other aspects must be taken into account. As designers, we must also think about the use of languages and fonts, layouts and surfaces, iconography, content and structure, navigation, multimedia, and color. Only when we delve deeper into these aspects of how cultural differences affect design can we make choices and decisions that truly serve a purpose for the target group.
However, before we can create cross-cultural patterns, we must first understand all the different elements of design that are governed by cultural needs and preferences. For example, it is when we start to reflect on design changes such as “How did someone figure out that it should be possible to set an alarm with only vibration and no sound?” that we grasp just how important culture is to design. The answer to that particular question takes us to Japan, where people often sleep on the train to work. They want to wake up in time to get off, but out of consideration for other tired fellow passengers, they didn’t want to be woken up by an alarm that bothers everyone else on the train. Hence the discreet — but effective — vibrating alarm function.
Usability with different fonts and written languages
Language is another element that serves as a cultural mirror. It goes without saying that designing text input in various written languages takes an enormous amount of work. Certain iconographical adaptations are also necessary, as some symbols may have unfavorable connotations in different parts of the world — but we’ll talk more about that later.
Before Sarah Larsson came to inUse, she worked for many years with a website for newly arrived immigrants. It focused on providing social information to help them understand the process of integration when they arrived in Sweden.
– Unfortunately, I didn’t have the benefit of doing user research. Instead, I had to rely on the client’s collaboration with reference groups. For example, I consulted with them on colours and typography, to help me harmonize both the feel and readability in Arabic and Persian. That led me to other typographical choices than I would otherwise have made based on my preconceived notions of what ‘looked’ easy to read. I must say that I googled a lot about Arabic web design during that period…
Another challenge with incorporating other written languages was to make the layout work with a variety of reading and writing directions and character systems.
– Interactive slideshows and maps were extra tricky, both in view mode and in the writers’ editing mode. But I learned a lot from it, especially about a lot of technology when it comes to character systems and font management on the web. I was particularly proud when I was able to guide developers in the right direction so they could get the most challenging language, Tigrinya, in place. They’d tried before and failed.
Colour has different connotations
Colours are an element that can have completely different meanings within different cultures. The various ways of perceiving colours often have a deep cultural significance and can have a major impact on how the user perceives your design. When Therese Johansson, UX designer at inUse, lived and worked in Toronto, she was part of an international team of mostly Chinese colleagues.
– When we were designing the company’s website, I developed what I felt was a light and airy design. It didn’t sit well with them at all. Why not? In China, white is considered an unlucky colour associated with death and grief. So in the end we settled on a website in black, grey, and red.
And Therese is not the only one of our colleagues who has encountered designers with different colour references when working on projects. Jeanin Day, Director of UX Research, recalls when she was commissioned to develop a new version of the company Ericsson’s intranet ten years ago.
– I did interviews and usage tests with Ericsson employees in San José, USA, some of whom had Asian backgrounds. I remember that their feedback on the visual expression was very different from the interviews in Sweden, for example.
– They thought the businesslike blue-grey-white visual design was extremely dull and rigid. They wanted more colour and life in the design. So I asked them to show me examples of sites that had a visual expression they were attracted to, and those had a lot of purple, pink and other bright colours instead.”
The conclusion we can draw from these experiences is that, as designers, we must often set aside our preconceptions about colours and their significance in order to appeal to the tastes of the intended users.
Iconography
When Amazon launched in India at the end of 2018, a problem arose due to a lack of cultural insight and UX research. Amazon couldn’t understand why customers in India didn’t use one of the most effective tools on its homepage — the search bar. It turned out that in India, the magnifying glass chosen as an icon was not associated with searching. In fact, when testing the user interface, it turned out that most people thought that the icon represented — believe it or not — a ping pong paddle! In this case, Amazon’s solution was to keep the magnifying glass but to expand the search bar and add a text label in Hindi to clarify the feature.
So culturally inclusive design doesn’t just involve making design decisions that are already established for a particular cultural group — it has just as much to do with adapting your view of design in a way that makes the intended message decipherable to the recipient. Perhaps you’ll even introduce something that eventually becomes a matter of course.
Designing for a market with a strong sense of cultural history
Culture is often something that has characterized people over a long period of time and is woven into many aspects of people’s everyday lives. There are good examples of this in New Zeeland for example, where English is the official language. However, the culture and language of the indigenous people on New Zeeland have over time been woven into and mixed with the English language. To only rely on English or to translate the indigenous influences is not socially accepted. Several cultural concepts aren’t even possible to translate, nor should one try to do so.
And it’s not only the language that can be sensitive. We must also be mindful of our image choices for products that concern many cultures. Varying attitudes about gender, clothing and religion in different parts of the world require designers to be extra careful when working with images. An image that appears innocent in Western culture can be downright insulting in the Middle East.
But on the other hand, making decisions entirely based on cultural differences can also be problematic. As in this famous example, when IKEA launched its catalogue in Saudi Arabia, they decided to airbrush out all the women portrayed in its catalogue. This completely violated IKEA’s values — which were also otherwise clearly expressed on their website. It’s important to be aware of what can provoke or stir up emotions within other cultures, but it is equally important for you and the company to agree upon which values you’re not unwilling to compromise on.
Dare to be curious — culture is not taboo
Are you uncertain about a cultural issue, or is there something you’d like to discuss further? Bring it up in your team or workplace. You’ll be surprised at how much experience you and your colleagues will have to share. But perhaps most importantly, take responsibility by doing some research yourself and go beyond your comfort zone. Because just as we grind and acquire our other design skills, this is an important part of being able to design for larger target groups and a wider variety of users.
During UX Designer Kim Dinh Thi’s time in Toronto, she had an important experience that she would like to see more of in workplaces in Sweden.
– In my last weeks working in Toronto, Canada, there was a lot of news about George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement. A colleague of mine wrote in our Slack channel about how she stood in solidarity with the black community and provided us with information on how we can support them too. That sparked a dialogue between the colleagues. Our Design Director then brought the subject up at a joint meeting with all the designers. I think it’s great when a company stands up for something important and demonstrates its support, but also how we as individuals and designers can take a stance and influence companies and workplaces.
If you want to talk more about how to design in a way that takes different cultural perspectives into account — bring the matter up with your boss. Ask for a workshop in designing for different cultures. If you have colleagues from other cultures than your own, get to know their backgrounds. Find out which holidays they celebrate and congratulate them on the day! Paying attention to each other’s cultural heritage in the workplace opens more doors and increases inclusion.
All these cultural differences may seem like a lot to take in, but we just have to start somewhere. At the end of the day, it’s all about paying attention and daring to ask questions where they’re needed. Good luck!
Sources and more reading:
https://www.toptal.com/designers/ux/guide-to-cross-cultural-design
https://medium.com/@cynthiarisse/designing-for-culture-be0d8be92422
https://uxdesign.cc/designing-for-various-cultures-717f9f3a4ca1
https://www.economist.com/leaders/2019/06/08/the-second-half-of-humanity-is-joining-the- internet
