Conducting a user study
Last updated on 2025-02-20 | Edit this page
Overview
Questions
- How can you efficiently take or create notes about each participant’s session in your user study?
- How can you productively stray from your interview protocol?
- How do you know when you have enough data?
Objectives
- Choose a method of recording your participants and taking notes
- Craft useful followup questions on the fly
- Elicit more detailed responses from participants
- Record notes that remain understandable and accessible over time
- Implement strategies for managing time during an interview
- Determine when data collection can end
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Recording notes
Read the following scenarios and answer two questions individually: What issues can you foresee for Rae in each of the following scenarios? What approaches could you take to mitigate those issues? When time is up, we will return to the group to discuss everyone’s responses.
Rae has gotten permission to record the session in Zoom, meaning they will also have access to a transcription of the session. No one else is available to join Rae as a note taker for the session.
Rae’s participant has asked them not to record the session and they do not have anyone else available to help take notes.
Rae used Zoom to record and transcribe their session, then immediately saved it to a drive that their whole department can access.
Rae was able to record and transcribe their session using Zoom and they also had someone else do a rough transcription while the session was conducted. Rae took notes themselves too.
Rae holds a session that covers highly technical material and uses a substantial amount of jargon.
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Key Points
- Some combination of leveraging transcription tools, partnering with a note taker, and reflecting on your session after it is concluded can ensure you have useful notes to use later
- Asking strategic follow up questions and leveraging a well developed interview protocol can help you get more information without losing track of your conversational thread
- Whether or not you have enough data depends on factors like your available time and resources, how likely you are to iterate on this topic, and how useful the insights you have gathered already are to you