How to interview people

Six variations on a text label

N = 100K trials / variation; t = 1 week

Think aloud

5. UCD approach

For example, the user-centered design process can help software designers to fulfill the goal of a product engineered for their users. User requirements are considered right from the beginning and included into the whole product cycle. These requirements are noted and refined through investigative methods including: ethnographic study, contextual inquiry, prototype testing, usability testing and other methods. Generative methods may also be used including: card sorting, affinity diagraming and participatory design sessions. In addition, user requirements can be inferred by careful analysis of usable products similar to the product being designed.

· Cooperative design: involving designers and users on an equal footing. This is the Scandinavian tradition of design of IT artifacts and it has been evolving since 1970.^[1]

· Participatory design (PD), a North American term for the same concept, inspired by Cooperative Design, focusing on the participation of users. Since 1990, there has been a bi-annual Participatory Design Conference.^[2]

· Contextual design, “customer-centered design” in the actual context, including some ideas from Participatory design^[3]

All these approaches follow the ISO standard Human-centred design for interactive systems (ISO 9241-210, 2010).

The ISO standard describes 6 key principles that will ensure a design is user centred:

1. The design is based upon an explicit understanding of users, tasks and environments.

2. Users are involved throughout design and development.

3. The design is driven and refined by user-centred evaluation.

4. The process is iterative.

5. The design addresses the whole user experience.

6. The design team includes multidisciplinary skills and perspectives.

6. User Interviews

How to interview people

Possibly your most important skill : hear about people’s experiences, learn their meaning & feelings, discover design opportunities

An interview is a method of asking questions and listening

– Uses a planned interview protocol – a set of questions

– Ask what you can’t observe

I know you are a nursing supervisor. If I followed you through a typical day, what would I see you doing?

7. Flow model
8. Breakdown
9. Consent Form
10. Contextual Design

User-Centered Design process

Goal is to find users: Desires, Intents, Drivers

Key Principles: Extend and support work practice

Work practice: Behaviors, Attitudes, Goals, Intents

Challenges for articulation: Users are experts at what they do

But they can’t articulate what they do

Data are hidden in everyday details

Field interviews: Natural context , Tacit aspects of users’ work practice, Consciously not available for users of what they are doing

Good design is systemic: High-level coherent direction, Design, Structural, Layout, Flow across the system

11. Contextual Inquiry

Contextual inquiry (CI) is a user-centered design (UCD) ethnographic research method, part of the Contextual Design methodology. A contextual inquiry interview is usually structured as an approximately two-hour, one-on-one interaction in which the researcher watches the user do their normal activities and discusses what they see with the user.

Contextual inquiry defines four principles to guide the interaction:

· Context—Interviews are conducted in the user’s actual workplace. The researcher watches users do their own work tasks and discusses any artifacts they generate or use with them. In addition, the researcher gathers detailed re-tellings of specific past events when they are relevant to the project focus.

· Partnership—User and researcher collaborate to understand the user’s work. The interview alternates between observing the user as they work and discussing what the user did and why.

· Interpretation—The researcher shares their interpretations and insights with the user during the interview. The user may expand or correct the researcher’s understanding.

· Focus—The researcher steers the interaction towards topics which are relevant to the team’s scope.

If specific tasks are important, the user may be asked to perform those tasks.

A contextual interview generally has three phases, which may not be formally separated in the interview itself:

· The introduction—The researcher introduces him or herself and shares their design focus. They may request permission to record and start recording. They promise confidentiality to the user. They solicit a high-level overview of the user’s work. They agree with the user on the specific tasks the user will work on during the interview.

· The body of the interview—The researcher observes the work and discusses what they see. They take notes, usually handwritten of everything that happens.

· The wrap-up—The researcher summarizes what they learned from the interview, offering the user a chance to give final corrections and clarifications.

Before a contextual inquiry, user visits must be set up. The users selected must be doing work of interest currently, must be able to have the researcher come into their workplace (wherever it is), and should represent a wide range of different types of users. A contextual inquiry may gather data from as few as 4 users (for a single, small task) to 30 or more.

12. Work models

Data from each interview is analyzed and key issues and insights are captured. Detailed work models are also created in order to understand the different aspects of the work that matter for design. Contextual design consists of five work models which are used to model the work tasks and details of the working environment. These work models are ^[2]:

· Flow model - represents the coordination, communication, interaction, roles, and responsibilities of the people in a certain work practice

· Sequence model - represents the steps users go through to accomplish a certain activity, including breakdowns

· Cultural model - represents the norms, influences, and pressures that are present in the work environment

· Artifact model - represents the documents or other physical things that are created while working or are used to support the work. Artifacts often have a structure or styling that could represent the user's way of structuring the work

· Physical model - represents the physical environment where the work tasks are accomplished; often, there are multiple physical models representing, e.g., office layout, network topology, or the layout of tools on a computer display.

13. Interview question types

Date: 2015-12-11; view: 1088