Table 1.
User-centered design methods and techniques
| Technique | Description | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| Phase I: Investigate | ||
| Artifact Analysis | Examine objects that are inherent to a product being designed, namely its physical appearance and how stakeholders interact with it | Understand an artifact’s properties, and its role or significance in various (e.g., social, cultural) contexts |
| Card-sorting | Stakeholders organize ideas into categories or groups that make meaningful sense to the organizer | Understand stakeholders’ preferences or understanding of a particular concept, or their ideas for how a product should be organized or navigated |
| Concept mapping | Create a visual depiction of the relationship between the research question a new design aims to address and the concepts that are related to it | Help designers understand and organize complex processes or relationships |
| Critical Incident Technique | Identify events in a workflow which stakeholders experience as particularly helpful or problematic to successfully using a product | Inform contexts for which a product can be particularly helpful, or features that can alleviate critical incidents |
| Design Ethnography | An immersive experience in which stakeholders are observed in their natural/typical context | Understand stakeholders’ experiences to inform how a product could improve that experience |
| Diary Studies | Stakeholders are prompted at different moments to share details about their experiences | Learn about stakeholders’ experiences in the context of their day-to-day life |
| Focus Groups | Moderated discussion amongst a group of stakeholders who are impacted by the research question | Gain insights into a group of stakeholders’ thoughts, feelings, experiences, wants, needs, and limitations |
| Image Boards | A collage of aesthetic imagery | Visually represent the style, experiences, stakeholders, or contexts that will be the focus of the product |
| Interviews | One-on-one discussion with a stakeholder, often involving a structured set of inquiries | Gain insights into stakeholders’ thoughts, feelings, experiences, wants, needs, and limitations |
| Personal Inventories | Stakeholders show and describe artifacts that are of personal significance in the context of their life | Understand the types of artifacts stakeholders need, use, and value |
| Photo studies | Stakeholders take pictures that show their experience with a particular problem area | Provide perspective into stakeholders’ experiences as they occur in their daily lives through pictures |
| Task Analysis | Identify the steps a stakeholder completes to perform a task, which can refer to mental or physical activities | Depict the relation between tasks, subtasks, decision points, and response cycles |
| Questionnaires | A measure with a series of items | Capture stakeholders’ perspectives |
| Phase II: Ideate | ||
| Design Charrette | A co-design process in which designers and stakeholders brainstorm designs in rotating small groups, allowing for idea collaboration and integration | Facilitate collaboration of ideas across stakeholders and designers to generate higher-level design concepts which fit stakeholders’ needs and preferences |
| Design Workshops | A process by which designers and stakeholders join together to “co-design” a product | Inform future designs through brainstorming ideas, organizing concepts, or creating drawings, collages, or prototypes that creatively express ideas or experiences |
| Personas | Character archetypes of different stakeholders who might engage with a product | Inform prototype designs and confirm that iterations of prototypes meet the goals of the various archetypes |
| Scenarios | A narrative that describes how different stakeholders would engage with a product | Inform prototype designs and confirm that iterations of prototypes stay consistent with their intended goals |
| Simulation Exercises | Designers approximate the experiences of stakeholders to experience empathy for stakeholders’ experiences | Inform insights into how certain features should be designed or integrated |
| Storyboards | A narrative showing a product’s use in a brief series of panels like a comic strip; includes images, brief narration, and progression through time | Demonstrate how stakeholders might interact with a product in its relevant context |
| Phase III: Prototype | ||
| Dark Horse Prototyping | Generate a “super” design solution that typically would have been ignored in the process because of its price, risk, or complexity to build | Push the boundaries of designers’ ideas to create a more optimal solution than might otherwise have been considered |
| Parallel Prototyping | After brainstorming a variety of prototypes, the best features from various designs are combined into one optimized design | Help designers avoid getting stuck on one prototype too early |
| Wizard of Oz | Simulate a fully functioning product by building a prototype through which interactions with stakeholders occur with a live person operating “out of sight” | Enable stakeholders to react to a prototype as though it had full functionality while saving time and money from building a fully functioning prototype |
| Phase IV: Evaluate | ||
| Cognitive Walk Through | Stakeholders are shown a product design and asked to demonstrate how they would use it based only on the cues and prompts provided by the product | Test the usability of the product’s interface by learning whether the order of prompts align with stakeholder expectations or perceptions of the experience |
| Desirability Testing | Stakeholders identify adjectives that describe, for example, the quality, appearance, and ease of use of prototypes | Understand how a prototype makes stakeholders feel to inform a design that elicits an optimal emotional response |
| Eye Tracking | Monitor where stakeholders look and do not look while interacting with a prototype | Inform aspects of the prototype that elicit fixation, although this technique cannot explain stakeholders’ reactions (e.g., emotional, comprehension) |
| Field Testing | Stakeholders engage with a prototype in the context in which the prototype is intended to work | Identify “bugs,” glitches, or usability problems prior to making the product available to all users |
| Heuristic Evaluation | Designers or domain experts evaluate prototypes for usability problems based on heuristics | Pragmatically identify usability problems based on a defined standard, rather than feeling and instinct |
| Think Aloud Protocol | Stakeholders are asked to talk out loud their thoughts, feelings, and actions while using a product or completing a task associated with the product | Observe the physical movements of the stakeholder while also learning what aspects of the product are perceived as easy to complete or difficult/confusing |
| Usability Testing | Stakeholders identify features that are not usable to inform necessary refinements and future designs | Confirm whether a prototype is usable, meaning easy to use, understand, learn, and/or remember |
Note: This list includes many but not all of the user-centered design techniques. More details are described elsewhere: (Bushnell, Steber, Matta, Cutkosky, & Leifer, 2013; Martin & Hanington, 2012).