There are many things to consider when designing for different generations. One of the most important ones would be the specific age group's understanding of technology. Generally its a downward slope from a young to mid age to older age. I would say my generation and the ones after have a strong understanding, followed by older generations who understand but aren't necessarily fully immersed and the oldest generations who in most cases avoid and dislike technology. So when a designer approaches any generation that is older, they have to make things simple and to the point. Not many people in the older generation understand loading time or fancy websites, so anything that isnt instant and you lose their interest. However it is the opposite for the younger generations. Yes they may understand if you wait for a few seconds the site will load but they dont want to. If they want to play a game it better load quick and be impressive, and if not they move on very quickly.
Another thing to consider when designing for generations is how accustomed they already are to the physical world rather than digital. The other day my professor (who is in the older generation of about 50+) said he has had a watch for years that he never changes the time for on daylight savings. He leaves it at the wrong time. He told us its because he cant figure out the whole digital system and if it were a manual watch he could change the time no problem. This mentality it common for older people but for younger people its the opposite. When faced with a digital watch and a manual watch, and told to change the time, i believe most kids would try the digital watch first. So for a designer these are things to consider. An ebook for someone that is older must practically look and feel like a real book or its likely they wont want to even try to figure it out. As for younger generations if its quick and impressive, they dont care how digitally advanced it is.
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