Qualitative UX Research Methods

Question 1

Interviews

Answer 1

a researcher meets with a study participant one-on-one to discuss topics around a product

Question 2

Ethnographic Field Studies

Answer 2

Researchers meet with test participants in their own natural context (an environment where they would most likely encounter the product), observe how users interact with a product, and ask related questions.

Question 3

Diary Studies

Answer 3

Test participants are given a mechanism to record and describe aspects of their lives that are relevant to a product. The diary can be physical or online. Typically, test participants document their activites over a prolonged period of time.

Question 4

Focus Groups

Answer 4

groups of 3-10 participants that gather together in one room to discuss a specific topic. These groups are led by a researcher who is present during the session to lead the conversation.

Question 5

Moderated Usability Testing

Answer 5

During usability testing, participants are given tasks to complete and the moderator tracks the participants progress. Moderators observe user interactions with a product and can dig deeper into points of interest.

Question 6

Card Sorting

Answer 6

asks test participants to organize content items into groups. researchers can provide existing categories and ask test participants to categorize the content into those groupings, or participants can create their own groups.

Question 7

Participatory Design

Answer 7

test participants are asked to create their ideal experince using a pen and paper or protoyping tool. by analyzing the design that test participants created, it becomes easier for UX researchers to understand what matters to them most and why.

Question 8

Best practices for Qualitative UX research

Answer 8

• Be clear about your goals
• Recruit relevant test participants
• Choose the research method that best fits your research topic
• • attitudinal research
• • behavioral research
• See how users interact with a product in their environment
• Use think-aloud protocol
• Do not influence test participants during the research process - do ask open and explorative questions, don’t interrupt test participants when they’re talking, don’t put words in the participants mouth.
• Systematize your research result analysis

Question 9

Qualitative UX research result analysis

Answer 9

• practice peer debriefing
• ensure that you have enough data
• use triangulation
• practice member checking