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session. This doesn't happen very often, but when it does, it makes the facilitator's job harder.
Why I Choose Co-Discovery
I've found that co-discovery works well for paper prototyping—I use co-discovery about half of the time
in nonpaper testing, and more like 90% of the time when testing a paper prototype. (I'm usually testing
on a tight schedule, plus it's easier for two people to share a paper prototype than a computer.) In
usability studies where I've done both single-user testing and co-discovery, most of the time the
product team has felt that they got more benefit out of the co-discovery tests. But this is a
generalization, and there are some usability specialists who believe that the drawbacks of co-discovery
outweigh its benefits. Although the rest of this topic assumes that you're testing with two users at a
time, I suggest that you try both methods and decide which works best for you.
Friends or Strangers?
There are some advantages in pairing up people who don't know each other. Usability guru Jared
Spool tells the story of how he once facilitated a test with a married couple who spent the entire
session communicating in half-sentences:
She: "Why don't we click on the..."
He: "I was just thinking that ..."
She: "Oh yeah, you're right—let's ..."
Jared dubbed this communication shorthand "married people's syndrome," but it can happen with any
two people who know each other well. (There's also an ominous variation where the users know and
dislike each other.) Strangers tend to be more thorough about discussing things, so their conversation
is easier for observers to follow. It's also easier to avoid inequities in power—a manager/subordinate
combination is especially risky.
Although I usually try to pair up strangers, this is not a hard and fast rule. There are some situations in
which it makes sense to recruit people who know each other:
The product is typically used by people who know each other (for example, a parent and child, or
people who are playing a game together).
The users are coming from some distance away (perhaps one of your customers) and want to
share a ride.
Users indicate that they would feel more comfortable working with someone they know.
To make the friends-or-strangers decision for your product, consider the circumstances of its use and
what will be most comfortable for the user population you've chosen.
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