Last week, I talked about why I made the decision to accept in-person UX research again even during the Covid-19 pandemic. Now in part two, after two weeks of in-person research, I'll go through my first pass at best practices for conducting individual research sessions in the hope that ...
I’ve read several people’s posts over the past few months saying that no user researcher should do in-person user research until such time as the Covid-19 pandemic has ended. That remote research fully covers all needs until then. That researchers should make a choice not ...
As with probably most of my UX peers around the world, I’ve been working remotely and social distancing because of Covid-19 for about seven weeks now. In that time, I’ve felt very lucky, having managed to go entirely remote without more than perhaps a 10% ...
Before saying anything else, I want to be clear that I’m biased. I love in-person interactions with people. Whether it’s user research or just working with colleagues, I’ll go the extra mile or two or a thousand (really!) to get in-person face time. There is a ...
As user experience professionals, we’re a passionate lot. We care deeply about the user – the customers that we design for. We look for meaning. We feel empathy, sometimes painfully so. But in our drive to help those users have meaningful interactions with the products ...
I got a request recently to price out an accessibility audit of a several thousand-page site. The expectation seemed to be that the entirety of the site would be reviewed in some fashion and then the site would be certified in some way to be ...
When I started in user research in 1994 I was titled a “human factors engineer” although I did neither human factors as we’d understand it today nor any kind of engineering. I’ve been privileged to watch user research evolve and grow and grow and grow ...
When I do usability testing, particularly with teams that have not been involved in the process before, I often find myself providing a mini lesson about what usability testing is (and is not!), how the process is going to work, and what they’re going to ...
One of the most exciting things for me when doing user research is having opportunities to interact with both stakeholders and participants in person. Thus, I gravitate to the kinds of projects where these interactions occur. Most frequently, at least some of the stakeholders who ...
In the decades that I’ve done user research, nearly all of my research has been conducted in English. While I’ve done some research in other countries and with products in other languages, either the product itself was still an English-language product or, when I didn’t ...
“You created a bad survey!” exclaimed a participant as we started off day 1 of a recent usability study. I tried to explain gently that the web application she was working on wasn’t actually a survey we had created but the product we were testing, ...
I largely do user experience (UX) research activities such as usability testing, cognitive walkthroughs, ethnography, interviews and focus groups all centered around how users and potential users would interact with existing, updated and new interfaces. Sessions and activities are typically scheduled to last about an ...
I’ve been impressed over the years by how Elon Musk consistently seems to achieve his goals, be it with Tesla, Solar City or Space X, so I wouldn’t be surprised to see his new startup, Neuralink, produce as promised. But that scares me. I’ve spent ...
Most qualitative usability testing studies that I do involve the creation of a screener early on in the research process. The screener is the product of a necessary effort to determine not only who specifically the expected users are of a product, but also how ...
Over the years, I’ve heard the same question again and again each time a new type of consumer technology starts trending and becoming part of popular culture: “So,” someone asks, “how is this going to change how you do user research?” I heard this question ...
In high school I was that kid that in theory was supposed to get top grades. I was serious in class, spoke intelligently and appeared studious. Yet my grades were not great – not terrible, just not what teachers were expecting of me. The truth ...
Recently I had the opportunity to do a usability test for a client that had previously used another vendor to conduct their research. As we were working together to develop screening categories for the study, we discussed the technological sophistication of their users. They knew ...
Article Abstract: This article focuses on how user experience research is unique in the marketing research space and why qualitative researchers must understand the differences to succeed in usability testing. While both marketing research and user experience (UX) research certainly add commercial value, marketing research ...
Focus groups, often maligned within the field of user experience for not being able to get the “right” information, are actually a great way to collect information. But as a tool, the value of focus groups is limited to only certain types of information gathering. ...
I’ve had several projects lately where I needed to check that a particular resource was accessible on a mobile device for people with disabilities, particularly those who use built-in screen reader software. Given that it has been possible to create accessible mobile-friendly webpages and apps ...
I’ve been working with participants in usability studies and other research for nearly 20 years now. I’ve met a myriad of interesting people: some had backgrounds or interests similar to my own, and others had vastly different backgrounds. I have learned a great deal from ...
A few years after Section 508 (web accessibility of US Federal sites) became an enforceable law in 2001, government agencies were very interested in having blind users actually try out their web pages to see if the pages were accessible. I remember 2004 – 2005 ...
At the UXPA 2013 conference that took place three weeks ago here in DC, I got to do my first Ignite talk thanks to Jonathan Strohl and Jen Romano Bergstrom who pulled me into a Fors Marsh led session on research methods. What is Ignite? ...
Update 5/14/13: Just found a very relevant article on Consumer Reports: How can I get prescription drugs during an emergency? We recently had the opportunity to do a research study with survivors of large-scale flooding who were themselves above the age of 65 or else ...
As a consultant specializing in user research, studying how users interact with Web and mobile resources, I wish I could give my clients a short contract to sign promising that if they work with me, they will definitely incorporate usability into their project. They will ...
A client hired Lebsontech for user experience related work, but partway through the process decided to use Lebsontech staff to address some other priorities that weren’t specifically user experience (UX) related. Since I knew funds were limited, using the funds and my team for this ...
Update 3/29/13 This blog has been the basis for: Lebson, Cory. 2012. "Making Usability a Priority: Advocating for the Value of User Research (PDF)." Intercom Magazine. October 2012. Lebson, Cory. "Making Usability a Priority: Advocating for the Value of User Research." Society for Technical Communication (STC) ...
Update 3/29/13 This blog has been the basis for: A reprint on usability.gov (May 28, 2014) Lebson, Cory. 2012. "Making Usability a Priority: Advocating for the Value of User Research (PDF)." Intercom Magazine. October 2012. Lebson, Cory. "Making Usability a Priority: Advocating for the Value of ...
How many sessions should a stakeholder observe? In an ideal world, the stakeholder would be able to observe all of the usability test sessions live. The stakeholder would get to see those that succeed with ease, and those that may have a fair bit of ...
A usability test, user interview, or any one-on-one qualitative research really isn’t entirely one-on-one, at least not in an ideal setup. Ideally, it involves two research staff members to do research with a single participant – a moderator and a logger. A focus group should ...
A friend asked me if I could take a quick look at a web interface that he was building. I reviewed the site and emailed him a few usability suggestions to consider. The suggestions basically focused on his approach to include a number of additional ...
A long-term Lebsontech client asked me to report on how often my usability recommendations were followed. The truth is, I didn’t really know. I had done research on a number of different sub-sites for this client and produced a ton of reports. While I had ...
Classic usability studies involve a lot of hours to prepare, to conduct the research and to write up a robust report of findings. There is often a recruiting fee for someone to recruit the “right” participants, and participants often get paid, typically $75 to $100. ...
My initial training in usability occurred during my undergraduate years, within the framework of my bachelor’s degree in psychology. The research methodology that was applied to usability fit well within an experimental psychology approach. After graduating with my psychology degree, I decided to pursue a ...
[Update 3/29/13 - This blog has been the basis for: Lebson, Cory. 2011. "The Critical Importance of Web Usability in Disasters: Agency-Wide Efforts to Promote Usability at FEMA (PDF)." International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM) Bulletin, Vol. 28, No. 11. November, 2011.] In the last ...
There are a number of American job types that have been somewhat successfully outsourced to other countries with cheaper labor. For example, with the low cost of telephone calls these days, in many ways, it does not really matter where a call center is located. ...
Although I interned in a usability lab while a psychology undergrad at University of Maryland, my undergraduate senior honors thesis was actually in the field of cognitive neuropsychology. Specifically, I conducted in-depth qualitative research on patients with frontal lobe damage, focusing on their ability (or ...
I love interacting with people but have never particularly enjoyed those interactions when over the telephone. No matter how clear the voice on the other end is, no matter how great it is to catch up with someone, I still have the vague impression of ...
