Wouter de Bres—Product Designer

Writing a Book about Product Design Psychology

I am writing a book about product design psychology. I never wrote a book before, I’m a terribly slow writer (besides the fact that my twin daughters don't exacty speed up the process of this side project) and I’m not a native english speaker so it might sound stupid to try it. But hey, not trying would always be more stupid. However, I might need some help. I need help with deciding topics and with my english. But if some of you are willing to give me feedback, I believe I will be able to write a book that can help designers better understand the psychological side of product design.

When I started out as a designer I felt embarrassed about actually being a psychologist instead of a designer — they might discover I’m a total fraud! But after a lot of hours designing, a gazillion projects and becoming more confident about my design skills I discovered that my background in psychology was actually very useful; design = psychology. I’m thinking of dividing the book into three sections: Psychology of the Designer, Psychology of Design and User Psychology. Below every section I wrote down possible chapters.

Section 1: Psychology of the Designer

  1. Chapter 1: The process of learning design
  2. Chapter 2: Cognitive biases
  3. Chapter 3: What is creativity?
  4. Chapter 4: Design team dynamics and design critiques
  5. Chapter 5: Fear of shipping
  6. Chapter 6: Grumpy Designer Syndrome

Section 2: Psychology of Design

  1. Chapter 7: Gestalt theory
  2. Chapter 8: Color psychology
  3. Chapter 9: Visual balance, white space
  4. Chapter 10: Copy writing
  5. Chapter 11: The importance of Simplicity
  6. Chapter 12: Cognitive load theory

Section 3: User Psychology

  1. Chapter 13: What is user experience
  2. Chapter 14: What is intuitive design
  3. Chapter 15: How do users make decisions
  4. Chapter 16: Social psychology in digital products
  5. Chapter 17: User motivation and product purpose
  6. Chapter 18: Retention and product stickiness

Like I mentioned above, I would love to get feedback from you. What do you think of the topics? Do you miss anything? Please let me know on Twitter.

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