Common User Research Questions

• User needs
• Context of Use
• Perceptions (pre-conceptions)
• Pain points
• Language and nomenclatura
• Norms

Gainsburg 2011: p.40

Survey tips

• Aim for 100+ completios per segment
• make it less than 15 minutes long
• ask about behaviour (not importance)
• clear, familiar language
• use scales (not y/n)
• randomise answers when appropriate
• don’t avoid open-ended input fields
• break up into pages

From UXLX11 (Johnny Holland)

How many participants?

‘Over the years, there has been plenty of debate over how many participants are enough for a study. It turns out we were looking in the wrong direction. When you focus on the hours of exposure, the number of participants disappears as an important discussion. We found 2 hours of direct exposure with one participant could be as valuable (if not more valuable) than eight participants at 15-minutes each. The two hours with that one participant, seeing the detailed subtleties and nuances of their interactions with the design, can drive a tremendous amount of actionable value to the team, when done well.’

JARED M. SPOOL: Fast Path to a Great UX – Increased Exposure Hours

Brainstorming

Brainstorming is a creative group approach to developing ideas and originating solutions during the ideate stage.
Brainstorming seeks to generate many different ideas that are subsequently pared back to a few possibilities for potential development. The brainstorming process starts by defining the problem to be addressed, selecting group participants that will address it, and forming questions with which to stimulate the creative process.

During the brainstorming session, participants have free rein to make Suggestions in a non-critical environment. This encourages the presentation of unusual and potentially useful ideas. Resources such as flip charts or a whiteboard may be used to facilitate the process and to record the ideas that are generated. Following the session, ideas are grouped by type and their suitability assessed in order for a shortlist of the best ideas to be formed.

Rules:

Do not criticise: this is the most important rule. Criticism prevents people from making suggestions and voicing options. Any idea is valid in brainstorming.

Keep the process manager-free: the presence of line managers may inhibit the flow of ideas.

Avoid resolve: do not start working up or resolving an idea that looks like a Possible . leader during the session. Instead, carry on generating ideas during the allotted time. Ideas can be resolved following the evaluation stage.

Work to a target: a numerical target helps idea generation as participants move away from standard thinking on the subject in order to achieve it. Focus on quantity, not quality

Clock watch: set a time b~ which the session should end. This helps to keep the pressure on, forcing more ideas to be generated.

Let go: participants must not be afraid of offering odd, wacky or wild ideas, although this does not mean participants should not take the session seriously.

Be inclusive: the session chairperson should prevent any group members from dominating the session and should encourage all members to contribute.

Ambrose/Harris 2010, p. 66

Drivers and barriers

The research stage aims to identify the drivers that stimulate the target group to act on a design and the barriers that could impede the success of a design.

Ambrose/Harris 2010, p.36

Biased answers in usability testing

Self-reported data is typically three steps removed from the truth:

• In answering questions (particularly in a focus group), people bend the truth to be closer to what they think you want to hear or what’s socially acceptable.
• In telling you what they do, people are really telling you what they remember doing. Human memory is very fallible, especially regarding the small details that are crucial for interface design. Users cannot remember some details at all, such as interface elements that they didn’t see.
• In reporting what they do remember, people rationalize their behavior. Countless times I have heard statements like “I would have seen the button if it had been bigger.” Maybe. All we know is that the user didn’t see the button.

Jakob Nielsen (2001): First Rule of Usability? Don’t Listen to Users

Landscape of user research

Landscape of user research and testing techniques from Mulder/Yaar (2010) p. 40

Diary study

Diary studies are carried out in the early phase of the audience research. They provide information about the type and chronology of users’ activities on a day-to-day basis. Similar to Twitter status updates, users submit statements about what they currently do (or try to do) in order to carry out their job. An aggregated and structured view of these statements helps to establish tasks, priorities, and the level of satisfaction with current systems and tools.

Benefits in a nutshell

• A diary study is a quick and inexpensive way to find out about users actual tasks and activities
• It provide insight into users’ actual needs and context
• It allows a large number of participants to contribute synchronously

Jonathan Ive: Apple design strategy > no focus groups

So how did the company decide what customers wanted – surely by using focus groups? “We don’t do focus groups,” he (Jonathan Ive) said firmly, explaining that they resulted in bland products designed not to offend anyone.

Christopher Frayling reminded us at that point of Henry Ford’s line about what his customers would have demanded if asked – “a faster horse” – and it’s surely true that the point of innovative companies is to come up with products that customers don’t yet know they need.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technology/2009/07/listening_to_mr_iphone.html

Card Sort

Card sort is a method used to discover the cognitive structures or constructs in people’s heads: how they group, categorise and prioritise content. Outcome: dentograms or ‘construct maps’

A card sort exercise is a method to discover patterns in the way people are thinking about a subject. In practice, a pile of cards with keywords or phrases covering the given topic as a whole is shuffled and shown to participants. They then organise these cards in groups and give every group a distinct label. The result can be analysed to establish patterns in the way people have organised the items.