Design and Order in Everyday Life

Abstract

Since the time of Aristotle, a recurrent theme among thinkers has been the idea that exists because it helps bring order to human experience. This notion still stubbornly survives, despite the fact that in recent times the arts have not been distinguished by a concern for maintaining harmony. Laszlo Moholy-Nagy claimed (not so many years ago) that the goal of is to form a unified manifestation ... a balance of the social, intellectual, and emotional experience; a synthesis of attitudes and opinions, fears and hopes.' Gyorgy Kepes thought that people of the twentieth century live in chaotic environments, are involved in chaotic relationships, and carry chaos at the core of their consciousness. The job of the artist, according to Kepes, is to reduce all this free-floating chaos by imposing order on the environment, and on our thoughts and feelings.2 Psychologist Abraham Maslow expressed a similar idea when he claimed that helps reconcile the conflict between ancient biological instincts and the artificial rules we have developed for organizing social life.' E. H. Gombrich restates this theme in its most complete form in his latest book on the psychology of design and decoration.4 But what does it actually mean to say that helps bring order to experience? How does this mysterious process take place? As a psychologist I was dissatisfied with the vague and metaphorical accounts of how affects the consciousness of the viewer. As a result, ten years ago my students and I conducted a study in which we interviewed a representative cross-section of families in the Chicago area, to find out how normal people responded to objects and design qualities in their environment. We conducted the interviews in the respondents' homes, asking them such questions as: What kind of art objects did they have in their homes? How often did they notice such objects? What went on in their minds when they did respond? Soon after we started interviewing, however, we realized that we were having difficulties. The people we talked to, even professional, educated persons, had very little to say about the subject. They were able to repeat a few impersonal cliches, but it was