Observing the User Experience, 2nd Edition

Chapter 8

More Than WordsObject-Based Techniques

The stuff that dreams are made of is often difficult to express in words but may be imaginable as pictures in your head.

Elizabeth Sanders, Generative Tools for CoDesigning

Talking and listening underpin most user research techniques. However, there’s a lot that people know and feel about the world that they have difficulty expressing in words. Maybe they have difficulty remembering the concrete details that will bring a vague memory of a vacation to life. Maybe they can’t quite articulate what would improve their experiences with a frustrating wait for medical attention in a hospital emergency center. Maybe they aren’t quite sure how to explain something as psychologically complicated as their ...