DH

3.1 Notes on User-Centered Design & Design Life Cycle

User-Centered Design

  • Design goal: meet user needs better than existing designs; focus on established tasks, not reinventing the wheel.
  • Example: Facebook improved socializing/communication without creating new core activities.

Key Concepts

  • User-Centered Design (UCD): consider user needs throughout the entire design process; integrate users rather than rely on guidelines alone.
  • Stakeholders: primary (direct users), secondary (interact with outputs), tertiary (affected but not interacting with system/output).
    • Example: grade book tool where teachers are primary, parents secondary, students tertiary.
  • Design life cycle is iterative; novelty should serve a purpose tied to user tasks.

ISO Principles of User-Centered Design

1) Explicit understanding of users, tasks, and environments
2) Users involved throughout design and development
3) Design driven/refined by user-centered evaluation
4) Process is iterative
5) Addresses the whole user experience
6) Multidisciplinary team involved (psychologists, designers, CS, domain experts, etc.)

Design Life Cycle (four phases)

  • Need finding: understand user, task, context, and environment
  • Design alternatives: develop multiple early approaches
  • Prototyping: build prototypes (low fidelity early; more refined later)
  • User evaluation: test with real users; iterate based on feedback
  • Cycle is circular: new insights lead to new need finding and design exploration; live-user testing continues after launch

Methods & Tools

  • Various methods to gather user information across stages; these tools form your toolbox
  • Naturalistic observation, interviews, surveys, focus groups, etc. will be covered (emphasis on starting point, not exhaustive depth)

Role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the design lifecycle

  • 3 primary uses:
    1) Jump-start baseline user-perspective: AI simulates user needs in a new domain
    2) Practice with AI as user: generate responses, rehearse interviews, rubber duck-style debugging with AI
    3) Prototyping assistance: AI tools speed up paper/prototype development
  • Important caveats:
    • AI cannot replace real user feedback
    • AI should not over-constrain design ideas; use as a speed tool
    • AI can help you plan evaluations and generate synthetic data for practice

Data types in evaluation

  • Two main categories: quantitative and qualitative
  • Quantitative data: numeric values; easier to analyze statistically
    • Subtypes: nominal, ordinal, interval, ratio
    • Nominal (categorical): e.g., commute mode; counts per category
    • Ordinal: ordered categories without known interval sizes (e.g., Satisfied to Very Satisfied)
    • Interval: equal intervals, no true zero (e.g., temperature in Celsius/Fahrenheit—ratios not meaningful)
    • Ratio: equal intervals with true zero (e.g., time, length)
    • Further distinctions: binary vs nonbinary; discrete vs continuous
  • Qualitative data: descriptions, transcripts, field notes, artifacts; richer but harder to analyze
  • Mixed methods: combine qualitative and quantitative to get a fuller picture

Coding qualitative data

  • Coding converts qualitative data into numeric categories (often nominal)
  • Pros: enables statistical analysis; provides a transparent methodology
  • Cons: loses some richness; potential bias
  • Output: numeric data with an auditable process; original data preserved for reference

Practical implications for your project

  • You should engage users early and often (teachers, students, parents in education tech; communities in CSCW; etc.)
  • Iterative cycle: need finding -> design alternatives -> prototyping -> evaluation -> repeat
  • Build a robust toolbox of methods for gathering the right data at the right time
  • Reflect on your own domain: how much user involvement, when, and with how many participants?

Quick domain example references

  • Mood recording improvement as a recurring design challenge example
  • Stash exemplifies a new UX approach to an old task (investing) by focusing on user experience
  • Cooper: “Inmates are running the asylum” highlights why user focus matters; keeps designers from being out of touch with users

Takeaway

  • The four-phase design life cycle enables true user-centered design when users are involved at every stage and data from both qualitative and quantitative sources are used to iterate and improve prototypes and final designs.