What is "interaction design"

n. (context software design English) The structure and definition of the behavior of a system, the surrounding environment, corresponding artifacts, and the elements whom communicate the aforementioned behavior.

Interaction design, often abbreviated as IxD, is defined as "the practice of designing interactive digital products, environments, systems, and services." While the digital side of this statement is true, Interaction design is also valid when creating physical (non-digital) products, covering the ideology of how a user may interact with it. Common topics that interaction design is most often associated with include design, human–computer interaction, and software development. While interaction design has an interest in form (similar to other design fields), its main area of focus rests on behavior. Rather than analyzing how things are, interaction design synthesizes and imagines things as they might or ought to be. This element of interaction design is what clearly marks IxD as an aspect of a design field as opposed to a science or engineering field.

While disciplines like software engineering have a heavy focus on designing for technical stakeholders of a project, interaction design is more geared toward satisfying the needs and desires of the majority of users of a given product.