Affordance of Automatic Flushers

Manufacturers wanted designers to come up with something new to entice buyers. It’s usage seems easy and it’s appearance seems simple. Even though toilets with automatic flush systems seem as if they afford us with the convenience of not having to reach for the flusher, they are designed with flaws that can frustrate the user at times.

The mapping of the system is quite simple. When you appear in front of it, it picks up your presence. If your not sitting/standing in front of it, then it would not.

Yet anyone who hasn’t ever seen an automatic toilet would first have to contemplate on the nature of their designs. A person’s conceptual model of the automatic toilet flush might be similar to the automatic hand dryer. Hence, the user might look for something to press on prior for it to activate, but this is contrary to the purpose of an automatic flushing system. So the person might create a new conceptual model, one that takes into account the relatively newly invented laser-based operating system. Most people are not used to this new technology, except that they might have seen it being used by clerks at shopping stores.

The automatic flushing toilet does not have visible parts that would allow the user to “activate” the system. How would the user know that the laser beam works correctly while they are doing their stuff? At the least, it should have some signals such as a flashing light or a beeping sound that would allow the user to know that they are using it.

The automatic toilet, of course, has constraints. The constraint is that the user has to sit at the precise spot in order for it to register; those who have some sort of back problems cannot sit straight, and so they might have to lean to the side in order to avoid the pain. Another constraint is that the user might feel the need to either stand or sit for a certain amount of time in order for the system to pick up their presence. There must be some sort of feedback that would allow the user to know that he or she has been there long enough for the system to run a flush.