Affordances
James J. Gibson · 1966
"Objects and environments don't just have properties — they signal what can be done with them, and that signal is what actually guides behavior, not conscious analysis of physical properties."
Gibson's 1966 idea reframed perception itself: you don't see a chair and deduce you can sit on it — the 'sit-ability' is part of what you perceive directly. He called this an affordance.
An affordance is a possibility for action an object offers a specific perceiver — a flat, knee-high, rigid surface affords sitting for an adult, not for an ant. Gibson's radical claim: we perceive these action-possibilities directly, without cataloguing physical properties and reasoning about them. Don Norman later popularized the term in design — a well-designed door handle makes 'push' or 'pull' obvious without a label; a bad one needs a sign.
What did Gibson mean by an 'affordance'?
Read more about the topic
The explanation above is written with AI assistance. These are the originals — go to them to check it.
- AffordanceWikipedia
- Top 10 Application-Design Mistakes (affordances & signifiers)Nielsen Norman Group
Form Follows Function
"A structure's shape should be dictated by what it needs to do, not by decorative tradition — form is a consequence of function, not a separate choice."