Next-level UX: Behavioural Design

You have definitely seen this. Everyone sitting around a table. The lead UX standing next to a wall covered in sticky notes. Labels like "Adventurous Sam" or "Shy Emma", followed by another colour of post-its pinpointing their frustrations, motivations and so forth. Each person in the room eagerly shouting new ideas and insights. The marathon of impromptu self-reflection continues. Aaand STOP! 🏁 The race is over. The trophy you might ask? A well-thought persona. 🏆 The UX analysis is done. Right?

Nooooo. Please don't say that. 🤯

The above phenomenon has been oversold as fluffy UX co-creation workshops over the past years. Fashionable design firms thrive on this offering and make the client feel like they're doing excellent work. 🥇

But are they?

It sounds to me that it's more about self-fulfilling practices rather than about actual knowledge of the user.

Unfortunately, the latter is generally true. Consequently, this type of exercises often brings along more harm than good. 🚨

The self-thought persona and various empathy exercises addressing the user usually lack concrete data on the actual user behaviour and behavioural science research.

Ultimately, this approach stands in the way to critically and, more importantly, objectively assess the viability of reaching the company's KPIs.

Allow me to explain it slightly better.

As much as introspection seems to be a great start, most of our behaviour is usually a product of factors that are outside of our conscious control and awareness. Let's face it: we are often terrible at self-reflection. 🤭

Why is that you might ask? Let me introduce you: the master of storytelling, aka your "left brain interpreter". We all like stories, right? 🧚🏼‍♀️

Well, then you'll like this one. The master storytelling is just marvellous. It creates a narrative out of events and, on top of that, it tends to add a causal explanation to shed light on why each thing actually occurred. 🗣

Did you ever asked yourself:

" Why did I actually do that?"

Then, just like me, you've fallen into the trap of the left brain interpreter. Your answer probably sounded incredibly rational and made total sense. However, the creative reasoning expressed by the left brain interpreter was most probably more convenient fiction rather than the objective truth.

An important side-note:

This is also the reason why interview-driven user research that is focused on asking why people like or dislike a specific experience, might not be the most productive exercise. For example, the classic: a new Fitness Application is being launched. The people in the user research are all extremely excited and explain how they're super motivated to get back in shape. However, they haven't set foot in a gym the past 2 years. 🚶🏽‍♂️

Once again, the following is often true:

Someone's behaviour tells you a lot more about their genuine motivation than sweet talking self-reflection.

That's why it might make more sense to focus on behavioural insights. 🕺🏻

Behavioural science and design, what's in the mix?

I'm guessing most of you have probably already heard about behavioural science. Great. 👏🏼 For those who are not as familiar with it, it's pretty simple:

Merriam Webster defines Behavioural Science as the following:

A branch of science (such as psychology, sociology, or anthropology) that deals primarily with human action and often seeks to generalize about human behaviour in society.

Next step: behavioural science + design = behavioural design 🌟

This is new to most people. In a nutshell, it's about designing a product or a service based on behavioural science findings and principles.

Over the past 70 years, behavioural scientists have been researching the human behaviour and have revealed why humans think and act the way they do. Companies like Instagram, Facebook and Snapchat incorporated the treasure chest of behavioural science in the design phase and this also explains part of their success. 🚀

How does this translate into reality?

It's all about the following 3 key components: initial behavioural research, iterations and analysing the actual user behaviour. 🎉

Designing products or services shouldn't simply be conceived from a design thinking perspective, but also from a behavioural science perspective. 💡

Initial behavioural research.

Before you start wireframing or even deciding on the main features, take a moment to set up the behavioural target profiles and their journey. Who are the users? What is their current behaviour? Which interventions can possibly change this behaviour? Etc.

Once you get the picture, analysing the actual behaviour and iteration is next. Of course, we want to launch a product or service as fast as possible. 🏎

However, do not make the mistake of neglecting the prior analysis as to ensure the right product-target fit, to begin with. If possible, even add some user testing in there. Come up with some dynamic prototypes, gather your target users and spend a couple of days user testing. The earlier you can ensure your design actually suits the end-user, the better.

Analysing the actual user behaviour.

Then, once officially launched, we look at the actual user behaviour. Look at the data. 📊 Are people actually signing up? Logging in? If so, how often? Which features do they mainly use? Basically, focus on the actual behaviour and not simply self-stated potential behaviour.

Iterations.

And then? It's pretty straightforward, really. Keep on iterating until you reach your ultimate objectives. 💫

The finish line is near, for real this time 🏁

My above manifesto should give you a quick overview of why the traditional way of design thinking workshops are not always enough and how we can improve this by adding behavioural science to the mix. Behavioural science is the key component that explains to us why humans do the things they do. These scientific studies offer us a better light on the truth than self-serving practices, which ultimately translates into a better user experience.

The outcome? 🔮 According to my predictions, designers that incorporate behavioural science will outperform traditionally trained UX designers in the coming years. 🌱

Please feel free to leave your thoughts below ✍🏼

Thank you,

Laura

Managing Partner, Business Development @ Spring Interactive. A behavioural design studio. laura@springinteractive.co