User experience designers emphasize the importance of conducting primary behavioral research to inform digital application design (traditionally web applications). The need for behavioral research, to better understand end-user lifestyle, is even more important when the chosen platform for the application is a mobile platform. "Mobile" IS a lifestyle (rather, a collection of lifestyles), as mobile applications are designed to be taken into different physical environments, both online and offline. Because mobile applications are used in such a wide variety of situations, guessing about how consumers interact with them could be a critical mistake. Because environment influences behavior, ethnographic research, conducted in the context of different environments, is a valuable way for user experience designers to accurately identify, prioritize, and model the user interface of mobile application features.
The following are some quick tips to help plan a contextual inquiry aimed to inform a mobile application user interface:
1. Identify the mobile application's target, end-user segment. Generally, research recruiting efforts should aim for an end-user segment which is most likely to adopt the proposed mobile application. This segment will form the basis of the screening criteria for the research study.
2. Choose a recruitment platform that is a likely destination for the target participant segment. If the company that is funding the research already has a mobile application in the market, the researcher may consider utilizing the mobile application's customer email database to solicit participants for the upcoming application research study. If not, the researcher should consider alternate methods to recruit the target segment. Using the Google pay-per-click advertising platform is a great way to reach likely customers, when study solicitations are set to be triggered when users perform keyword queries related to the topic of the mobile application, and modified with the phrase, "app."
3. Develop a line-of-questioning that makes some informed assumptions about primary mobile use cases. I would never recommend biasing the research by influencing customer responses with suggestions about how the participant "might" behave in a given situation, but making internal assumptions simply makes research easier. A school of thought exists that exploratory research should be unencumbered (not biased) by preconceptions. This school of thought poses risk to the outcome of the research, in my opinion, because it leaves the potential to waste precious time with end-users, and precious funds from clients, on irrelevant findings. Taking a more structured approach, when planning for contextual inquiry, requires the development of open-ended questions that seek to validate theories. In this manner, a research moderator can control the flow of the dialogue, keep the interview relevant, and not bias the research with the moderator's "point of view."
4. Meet participants for lunch or coffee prior to the contextual inquiry. Seriously. The key to contextual research is natural, end-user behavior. Think about it. There can be significant reduction in participant nervousness or social anxiety if the participant and the researcher break the ice for for a few minutes prior to the study. Since the topic of the research is mobile behavior, plan to meet the participant close to where the application would likely be used ("on the go"), and make small talk with the participant for 10-15 minutes.
5. Watch the participant use a similar mobile application to the one being developed, in the context of where the participant would likely use the application. Begin by asking the participant to recreate a task that was recently performed, or perform a high-frequency task. Ask the participant to verbally describe the task, as it is being conducted. Observe how the participant performs the task, as well as how the environment around the participant is utilized in the completion of the task. What information is needed to perform the mobile task? What is the task sequence? The answers to these questions will help the mobile application design team develop the high-level information architecture for the mobile application, as well as the user interface design.
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