The world, and this maneki neko, beckons! — Photo by Miguel Á. Padriñán: https://www.pexels.com/photo/japanese-lucky-coin-cat-932261/

Google Translate is a powerful tool, even if it’s not yet on par with Star Trek’s universal translator. When I’m exploring a part of the Internet totally foreign to me–a site written entirely in Ukrainian for example–I can rely on both Google and the universal language of design to help me navigate these unfamiliar waters. Design standards like back buttons, shopping cart icons, and logos can show me the way, even if I don’t understand the text written beside them.

Is design really a universal language? In a sense, current design standards are a parent language. There are many rebellious children that have deviated and established their own standards over time. This means that as UX designers and researchers, we should not assume that each culture adheres to what we have come to see as standard, unbreakable design rules. If there is one golden rule to UX research, I believe it should be that “there is no such thing as normal.”

Therefore, it is our responsibility as UX professionals to explore beyond our comfort zones and learn a global, international approach to user experience.

Lindie Botes: UX designer and polyglot

Lindie Botes presenting at the 2019 Polyglot Conference — https://lindiebotes.com/2019/10/25/polyglot-conference-2019/

Lindie Botes is who I want to be when I grow up. (Even though I think we’re around the same age.) Botes is a talented UX designer and a polyglot. Her hobby is studying languages, and she’s mastered quite a few. Her penchant for picking up languages has led her to working all around the globe–from Japan to Singapore to South Africa–giving her a unique perspective on how design differs between cultures.

Last year at the annual Polyglot Conference, Botes put some of her observations into an inspiring talk entitled, “App Design for the World: Considering Languages, Scripts and Digital Literacy” which is available on YouTube. Here, she notes the way the Japanese Internet has shirked the ways of minimalism in favor of information density. She shows how different alphabets can transform a design: Chinese hanzi, or logograms, communicate a lot of information in very little space while languages like Hungarian need breathing room.

Flickr’s chart showing ratios of how much space different languages take up — https://www.w3.org/International/articles/article-text-size

Her presentation demonstrates the importance of getting to know other languages and cultures as a designer. It is not enough to plug copy into Google Translate and hope for the best. (Indeed, this can lead to outright disaster.) User experience encourages us to think from the user’s perspective, and that perspective is deeply informed by culture.

You don’t have to learn seven languages like Botes in order to understand how design might differ across cultural barriers. There are ways that we can familiarize ourselves with the foreign so that, as UX professionals, we can provide intuitive, accessible, and perhaps universal experiences.

How to burst your bubble

Think internationalization > localization > translation

Okay, but what does that mean? The W3C describes internationalization as the process by which designers and developers “design or develop your content, application, specification, and so on, in a way that ensures it will work well for, or can be easily adapted for, users from any culture, region, or language. This is where you address the first set of barriers: not the fact that your user can’t read or relate to your product, but the barriers that make it difficult to adapt your product so that they can.”

The right-to-left version of Facebook via https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2017/11/right-to-left-mobile-design/

Early in the ideation process, steps can be taken toward internationalization by considering the needs of other languages and cultures. Whatever text you use, it should be able to be converted into other languages, whether that be the Latin alphabet or Japanese kanji and hiragana. Recently, Michalina Bidzinska wrote a compelling piece here on Medium about right-to-left interfaces for languages like Arabic and Hebrew. Likewise, the W3C recommends keeping these right-to-left languages in mind when coding, “that way, when the direction of a page changes, the mirroring happens automatically and without the need for the translator to mess with your code.”

Next comes localization, which is so much more than just translation. Translation only effects the language of the product, while localization takes into account the culture of the people using the product. When media from Japan is localized for the West, names are switched from the Japanese tradition of last name, first name (think Smith John) to what is expected in most Western cultures (John Smith.) Or they might be changed entirely. Did you know that Ash Ketchem’s “real” name is Satoshi?

Because American children could never understand what a rice ball is, the English language version of Pokemon called them “jelly donuts.” As if that made things less confusing.

I knew that a lot of… liberties were taken in localizing the Japanese Pokemon series to the West back in the late ’90s. However, in the latest mainline Pokemon games, Pokemon Scarlet and Pokemon Violet, I was surprised to learn that my favorite character Arven was actually called ペパー (Pepper as in peppermint) in the non-localized, Japanese version of the games. “Arven” is taken from Mentha arvensis, the scientific name for the corn mint plant. This kind of pun-preserving name changes have occurred for many of the series’ characters.

A great example of localization trumping translation is Coca Cola’s “Share a Coke” campaign. Coca Cola is a global company, and thus took into consideration all the cultures that the company markets itself to. In the United States, people might find cans encouraging them to share a Coke with Zack or Ashley. In Ireland, Coke chose names like Aoife and Oisín.

Would Indonesian Coke drinkers feel as friendly toward the brand if the cans asked them to share with someone they’ve never heard of? Probably not. Localization keeps the user at the center of the design, and is much more nuanced than blunt force translation.

Familiarize yourself with other cultures

Now, I’m not saying you have to pick up a degree in International Studies or anything. But to be worldly is to be aware of the world. Dutch social psychologist Geert Hofstede has already done the work for us in making a glanceable way to measure how culture might impact outlook. His “6-D model of national culture” examines —

1. Power distance

Cultures with a small power distance can be thought of as more democratic–users will assign authority to sources that they have checked out themselves. They will investigate reviews and do outside research before deciding your product is worth it. Cultures with large power distances are more used to authority being pre-assigned, and thus trusting of what you might offer as an apparent authority on whatever subject your product is related to.

2. Individualism vs collectivism

Individualist cultures value independence and thus trust individuals to decide what is best for their particular situation. These are the cultures okay with doing a little DIY. Collectivist cultures keep society at large in mind, and therefore could be swayed by popularity ratings or might want some reassurance that they can find help if doing it themselves is the only option.

3. Masculinity vs femininity

Masculine cultures place a lot of value on success, and then showing off that success. Competition is common. Feminine-leaning cultures are more in touch with the collective and are more apt to avoid conflict. Limited time offers, sweepstakes, and competitions appeal to masculine cultures. Testimonials, examples of group-oriented benefits, and collaboration appeal to feminine cultures.

4. Uncertainty avoidance

Cultures that are tolerant of uncertainty are okay without knowing all the details: your product listing doesn’t need to have an exhaustive amount of information. Cultures that are uncertainty avoidant are likely to appreciate a dearth of detail and won’t make decisions without having all the facts. They want to know, for example, where the product will ship from, how long it will be in transit, and when it will show up at their front door.

5. Long-term vs short-term orientation

Hofstede calls this flexhumility vs monumentalism. Simply put: how much does the culture in question value tradition? Long-term, or flexhumble, oriented cultures view the world as ever-changing and thus priorities to preserve the future might shift era-to-era, year-to-year. Short-term oriented or monumental cultures place priority on tradition. A lot of change will turn them off.

6. Indulgence vs constraint

Indulgent cultures celebrate the free, and hedonistic goals are normalized and acceptable. Constrained cultures might be a little more embarrassed at the idea of pursuing instant gratification. An abundance of items or offers might be seen as excessive to someone from a constrained culture.

From Hofstede Insights’ Country Comparison tool — https://www.hofstede-insights.com/country-comparison/

As I mentioned before, Hofstede Insights is just one glanceable way to examine different cultures. Not all cultures are monoliths, and the people within them are ultimately individuals with unique thoughts and feelings. Culture and language are just two of many, many factors that influence those thoughts and feelings. Plus, there is always more to be done to familiarize oneself with a particular culture.

Explore the world through the web

Another way to break out of your own culture’s bubble is by exploring the world through the web. See if the grass is greener on the other side, as it were. Ignoring the big, global names like Google and Instagram, what are the most popular websites in the country you’re interested in? How does their approach to UX differ?

Just look at how different Yahoo! Japan is to the Western one you might be familiar with:

Yahoo! Japan is dense with information and links. Via http://shindoisshin.net/blog/2013/9/6/japanese-design-through-the-lens-of-two-companies

American Yahoo has much more white space in comparison. Via http://shindoisshin.net/blog/2013/9/6/japanese-design-through-the-lens-of-two-companies

You can check out popular sites country-by-country, industry-by-industry on Semrush’s Open .Trends site. Comparing, contrasting, and then consulting Hofstede Insights might just yield some interesting observations. (Japan is a collectivist culture and has extremely information-dense UI design… there’s a connection there…) Please, let me know if you have spotted any connections between the Hofstede model and the UX design of a particular culture in the comments!

You can check out popular sites country-by-country, industry-by-industry on Semrush’s Open .Trends site. Comparing, contrasting, and then consulting Hofstede Insights might just yield some interesting observations. (Japan is a collectivist culture and has extremely information-dense UI design… there’s a connection there…) Please, let me know if you have spotted any connections between the Hofstede model and the UX design of a particular culture in the comments!

There’s many industries that have to take internationalization into consideration. — Photo by Esther: https://www.pexels.com/photo/close-up-photo-of-baggage-sign-746500/

TL;DR What are the benefits of global UX?

Design can be called a universal language, but expecting it to translate one-to-one in all cases, across all cultures is folly. Colors have different meanings in different cultures. Some words don’t have direct translations that capture their full meaning. Symbols can differ across cultures. This is why, as designers, being aware of these differences is paramount to success. We can’t, and shouldn’t, ignore users from other cultural contexts. We have to burst our bubbles and aim for internationalization, rather than simplistic, error-ridden translation. Making real connections with users, speaking to them in their language, is powerful.

This means we should strive to take the time to check out core values and aspects of other cultures. This can be done in a very surface level way through Hofstede Insights. Deeper dives are necessary, and can be done by exploring foreign parts of the Internet. Taking a page out of the lovely Lindie Botes’ book and picking up a language or two is yet another way to become a more worldly UX professional.

There’s tons more to read on this subject, and I’d love to hear about any other ways I can better familiarize myself with other cultures. Let’s chat in the comments! 話しましょう！

Further reading:

https://uxdesign.cc/designing-a-robust-right-to-left-ui-in-arabic-hebrew-and-farsi-d1e662a09cfa

https://uxdesign.cc/how-culture-impacts-ux-design-6443a80319f3

https://bootcamp.uxdesign.cc/the-ux-of-japanese-website-design-b982076af2d5

https://youtu.be/z6ep308goxQ