brunobergher::blog

Jakob Nielsen published a few days ago his findings from research on the way users performance differs along the 25-60 years old range.

The article is definitely worth reading, is not long, and brings some interesting information.

In a nutshell, Nielsen found out that, according to his sample of 61 users, user performance (time spent to achieve each task) increases linearly by 0.8% by year, up to this 60 year old mark (beyond that this number increases faster). But the thing that caught my attention the most as this paragraph:

There’s also a covariant: the age at which people started using the Web. Because the Web is relatively new, a 50-year-old might have started using it at age 40, whereas a 30-year-old might have started at age 20. In contrast, by 2050, a 50-year-old will have used the Web since age 5, and thus benefit from 45 years of experience. A 30-year-old user in 2050 will have only 25 years’ Web experience. This added experience might eventually allow older users to catch up and somewhat reduce the 0.8% gap. Although we obviously can’t predict the future, my guess is that the age penalty will drop to around 0.5%/year. Still, this doesn’t matter much for your Web strategy over the next 10 years: the 0.8% level is where we’re at and where we’ll remain for some time.

We design for a medium that is new to anyone, and which is currently more attractive to younger people (for a while). It surely doesn’t affect designing for the web for now, but it’s interesting to consider that in a few decades, older people with effectively have more computer and web experience than young ones, and this will turn the playing field in a different direction.

It’s also worth of notice his assertion that when designing for people older than 60 requires a whole different approach, and perhaps, in some cases, a different interaction flow than from other users. Kind of like a ’seniors only’ line in a supermarket or bank.