Database Reference
In-Depth Information
Interpretation:
Determine the meaning of the user's words, emotions, and actions to-
gether with the user by sharing your interpretations and letting the user respond—tuning
andcorrectingyourunderstandingalongtheway.Co-interprettoproduceanunderstanding
of how users do the targeted activities, but also how they contribute to their overall life.
When immersed in the context of their real life, people will remember what matters. They
will not let you mis-construe their motivations.
Focus:
Steer the conversation to meaningful topics by paying attention to what falls
within project scope and ignoring things that are outside of it. Use insights into life from
the Cool Concepts and the Contextual Design models to focus yourself on relevant detail.
Let users know the focus so they can steer, too.
A Contextual Interview starts like a conventional interview, with intro-ductions and an
overviewoftheuser'ssituation.Atthispointwealsoprobetodiscoverelementsofidentity
important to the user to raise them to awareness and discussion throughout the interview.
We then transition to ongoing observation and discussion with the user about that part of
the practice that is relevant to the design focus. We watch the user's actions, verbal clues,
and body language. We listen for the role of relationships in this activity, collaborations,
hassles, and aspects of tools that evoke or reduce joy. We share our insights, understand-
ings, and confusions with users in the moment, inviting the user into a conversation about
whatishappening,why,andwhatthatimpliesforanysupportingproduct.Asmuchaspos-
sible we keep the user grounded in current activity, but also use artifacts to trigger memor-
ies of recent activities. If an interesting event happened in the recent past, we re-tell the
story of that event, re-enacting it if possible and using artifacts to help recall details.
Throughout the interview, the Cool Concepts augment the focus of the interview. Each
Concept suggests aspects of life that may matter for design. In addition to this general fo-
cus, the interviewer guides the user through some directed tasks to reveal key information
related to the concepts:
Accomplishment:
Theinterviewerlistensforhowtasksaresplitacrosstime,place,and
device. If a task is done at the office, is any part of it ever done elsewhere? Research for it
done at home? Coordination done with calls from the car? Do users interrupt themselves at
points in the task to get a mental break? Designers can nolonger assume that a task is done
in one sit-down, focused session.
To see how life and work interleave throughout the day, at some point in the interview
the interviewer and user walk through one or more of the user's specific past days, dis-
cussing what happened at each point in the day and how the user's technology enabled
(or inhibited) doing the tasks of work and life. Interviewers pay special attention to how
activities are broken up into chunks of time and get done across platforms and with mobile
devices, when the user's attention is split between activities, and the content they access at
each point.
