Empathy

A type of understanding that is achieved by taking the perspective of another individual. Different people's perspectives often have different needs and values, so empathy can help you understand those differences.

More terms you might want to know

PNG Image

A PNG (Portable Network Graphics) file is a bitmap image format that has been designed to store images with an alpha channel. This format is primarily used for transparency so that it can be placed over other graphics in many design applications.

Affinity Diagram

A data visualisation tool that can be used to explore and group people's thoughts or reactions to a set of concepts. Affinity diagrams are often used in user research and design thinking as an experimental technique for generating new ideas or solutions.

The emergent patterns in these visual representations can help identify which aspects your audience will respond well to, thus enabling decisions on the information architecture and next steps in the process.

It is important to note that affinity diagrams were initially developed for qualitative research but have since been adapted for quantitative research (though they are not typically used with statistical data).

Mock-up

A non-functional first draft of a design.

Interaction Design

The design of the interaction between users and products. Interaction design is focused on creating products that enable the user to achieve their objective(s) in the best way possible.

Bowl

In typography, a bowl is a curved shape used to control the area of white space.

Card Sorting

A UX design technique in which you divide your users into groups, show them cards with different names for unrelated objects and ask them to categorise them.

Breadcrumb Navigation

Typically used on the internet or web pages to provide easily accessible navigation for users. Typically, the breadcrumb navigation appears along the top of a webpage or at other locations on a webpage so that users can know where they are on a site quickly and efficiently.

Widow

The last line of a paragraph following the rest, or a single line in a paragraph that is out of place with the rest.

Font Case

The way characters are capitalised within a word or phrase. Common font cases are uppercase, lowercase, capitalised (or title case) and sentence case.

Bold

A greater typographic weight than the standard typeface, often used to highlight text that the writer wants to emphasise or denote sections, headlines or quotes in printed material.

Bold type is a little heavier than the average type because of its higher contrast, making it more readable. The opposite of bold type is light type, also known as regular or book.

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