1. David Geerts
Research Manager
Centre for User Experience Research (CUO)
K.U.Leuven
Creative methods for designing and
evaluating user experiences

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Agenda
The User Experience
Analysis methods
Requirements specification
Design methods
Evaluation methods

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Agenda
The User Experience
Analysis methods
Requirements specification
Design methods
Evaluation methods

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First wave HCI (70’s-80’s)
Cognitive approach
» Human as information processor
» Interaction between single user and computer
» “Human factors”
Disciplines
» Cognitive psychology, computer science
Methods
» Rigid guidelines, controlled experiments, formal methods,
user modelling, …
Theories
» GOMS (Goals Operators Methods Selection rules), KLM
(Keystroke Level Model), Fitt’s law, Hick’s law, …

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Second wave HCI (80’s-90’s)
Social context
» Groups working with collection of applications
» Work settings and communities of practice
» “Human actors”
Disciplines
» Social sciences, anthropology
Methods
» Ethnographic observations, participatory design,
prototyping, contextual inquiry, …
Theories
» Activity theory, situated action, distributed cognition, …

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Third wave HCI (90’s-00’s)
User experience
» Private and public environments
» The home, everyday lives
» Culture, emotion and experience
» Non-work, non-purposeful, non-rational
Disciplines
» Design research, cultural studies
Methods
» Exploratory methods, cultural probes, narratives,
experience prototyping, …
Theories
» Emotional design, four pleasures, threads of experience, …

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Designing the user experience?
Avoid negative emotions vs. produce positive
emotions
Making products challenging, seductive, playful,
surprising, memorable, moody, enjoyable, …
It is not possible to design the user experience, you
can only design for the user experience
» Exploit design solutions that evoke or intensify certain
feelings
A holistic view on designing products

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User Experience Models

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User Experience Models

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A model of user experience (Hassenzahl)

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User Experience Models

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Emotional design (Norman)

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User Experience Models

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User-product interactions and experience
(Forlizzi and Battarbee)

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Agenda
The User Experience
Analysis methods
Requirements specification
Design methods
Evaluation methods

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Cultural probes
 Collections of evocative tasks meant to elicit inspirational
responses from people
» Package with e.g. postcards, maps, camera, diaries, … with
assignments, often provocative or ambiguous
» Materials are returned one by one during a short period
» Fragmentary clues about users’ lives and thoughts
 Inspiration, not information
» Stimulate imaginations rather than defining problems
» Openly subjective and playful
» Use ambiguity, absurdity and mystery
 Recognizes and embraces the notion that knowledge has its
limits
» Values uncertainty, play, exploration and subjective interpretation
» ‘Unscientific’ approach, a subversion of traditional HCI methods

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18. Dante’s Hell
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Advantages of cultural probes
 Provide opportunities to discover new pleasures, new forms of
sociability and new cultural forms
» Not designing solutions to user needs
» Offer possibilities for surprising results
» Doesn’t focus on an ‘average’ user
 Reduce distance between researchers and users
» Formal, geographic and cultural distance
» Through its design and communication, the designers make their
intentions clear
 Gives a deep sense of familiarity and engagement with the
people you design products for

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From probes to design
 Probes are not meant to be rigorously analysed
» Serve as inspiration for reflecting
» Don’t directly lead to designs
» Making you aware of the detailed richness of an environment
» Embraces subjectivity, uncontrolledness and personality
 Prevent from believing you can look into people’s heads
» Impossible to arrive at comfortable conclusions
» Understand their responses empathetically
» Make the strange familiar, and the familiar strange
 Probes are only one source for designing product
» Some design decisions directly based on probe returns
» Create a relationship with users, like designing for a friend

21. Example cultural probe results
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Agenda
The User Experience
Analysis methods
Requirements specification
Design methods
Evaluation methods

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Extreme characters (Djajadiningrat)
Fictional users with exaggerated emotional attitudes
» Take another perspective
» To highlight cultural issues
» Complementary method, not replacing personas
Advantages
» Character traits can be exposed which normally
remain hidden because they are antisocial or in
conflict with a person’s status.
Disadvantages
» It is not your user, not based on data
» How many extreme characters?
» Which extreme characters?

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Example extreme character for agenda planner
 The drug dealer
» Information is very
sensitive, cannot fall in
the wrong hands
» He does not plan far
ahead since dealers
come and go

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Agenda
The User Experience
Analysis methods
Requirements specification
Design methods
Evaluation methods

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Experience prototyping (Buchenau and Suri)
 “A form of prototyping that enables design team members,
users and clients to gain first-hand appreciation of existing or
future conditions through active engagement with prototypes”
» What are the contextual, physical, temporal, sensory, social and
cognitive factors we must consider for our design?
» What is the essence of the existing user experience?
» What are essential factors that our design should preserve?
 Example: experience of a heart patient
» Designers were given a pager for a weekend
» When the pager went off, this simulated a defibrillating shock
» Designers had to record their current experience
 Closely related to role playing

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Examples of experience prototyping

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Agenda
The User Experience
Analysis methods
Requirements specification
Design methods
Evaluation methods

31. UX evaluation methods
Most amount of new methods in this category
» A lot of research in this area
» New methods or variations are being discussed at several
conferences (e.g. see http://www.allaboutux.org/)
Different classifications possible, based on
» Verbal or non-verbal measurement
» Quantitative or qualitative results
» Phase in the design process
» General type of evaluation (lab, field, survey, …)
Analysis, design or evaluation?
» Some methods could be used in several stages
» Only evaluation when interaction with product is the focus
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Verbal vs. non-verbal methods
 Non-verbal observation methods (‘objective’)
» Language independent, unobtrusive, more objective
» Limited set of basic emotions, no combination of emotions
» Psycho-physiological measurement, facereading, emotion heuristics
 Verbal self-report methods (‘subjective’)
» Subjective feelings measured through self-report
» Can represent any set of emotions, can measure combinations of
emotions
» Difficult to apply between cultures
» Questionnaires, rating scales, laddering
 Non-verbal self-report methods (‘subjective’)
» Subjective feelings, distinct or combinations of emotions
» Does not require subjects to verbalize emotions
» Self-Assessment Manikin (SAM), Product Emotion Measurement
Instrument (PrEmo), Emocards

33. Means End Theory
A theory to understand how specific features or
attributes (means) of a product relate to personal
values (ends)
» People choose a product because it has attributes (the
means) that provide consequences and fulfilling personal
values (the ends)

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Examples
Attributes
» colour, taste, design, …
Consequences
» Functional: price, quality, user-friendliness, …
» Psycho-social: habits, reliability, …
Values
» Health, security, fun, social power, …

36. Glass => transparent, see what is in it => make sure
it is healthy => my children deserve the best => I am
a good mom
Glass => can be cleaned and reused =>
environmentally friendly => save the planet
Plastic => light => easily disposible => practical =>
more time for more important things => you have to
be productive and get ahead in life
Example: Yoghurt packaging

37. One particular method for researching means-end
chains
» Not the only one but the most popular in consumer
research because it proved to be superior
Entails both a
» qualitative technique (which ladders)
∙ How to interview
» quantitative technique (which are dominant)
∙ How to analyze data and generalize from it
Laddering

38. • Graphs the dominant
links in a hierarchical
value map (HVM)
• association network
• meaningful couplings
between attributes,
consequences and values.
(reynolds and Gutman,
1988)
Hierarchical Value Map

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How to perform laddering
One-to-one in-depth interviews
» Researcher asks question ‘what do you like about [product
x]’
» After first answer, question is reformulated to ‘what do you
like about [answer]’
Reveals the relation between
» Product attributes (A)
» Product consequences (C)
» User’s values (V)
Results in means-end chain

40. Example of laddering interview
Researcher: I forgot again, which one did you like most?
Child stands up and points at the bird
Oh yes, the bird, can you tell me why?
"Because I like it"
Ah, because you like it, and can you tell me why?
"The tumbling it makes” [A]
Ah, the tumbling it makes, and why is that nice?
"Because that is so funny” [C]
Ah, and why do you like it when it is funny?
"Because it is really cool that it can make a looping" [A]
Ah, and why do you like that it makes a looping?
"Because sometimes they fall on their bum and they do
funny"[A-C]
Ah, and why do you like that it is funny?
"That they fall on their bum" [A]
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Example means-end chain

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Example means-end chain

43. AttrakDiff evaluation (Hassenzahl)
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44. AttrakDiff results
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45. Emocards (Desmet)
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46. Example analysis emocards (Wimmer e.a.)
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Sensual Evaluation Instrument (Isbister e.a.)
A tool for self-assessment of affect while interacting
with computer systems
» Subjective
» Real-time feedback
» Transcending language and cultural barriers
» No distortion through verbalization
» More fun for the user

48. Example analysis SEI (Wimmer e.a.)
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49. Example analysis SEI (Wimmer e.a.)
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50. Questions?
david.geerts@soc.kuleuven.be