- Users can easily talk about what they are doing and why as they are doing it. This way, contextual inquiry can provide richer and more relevant information about how users complete processes than self-reported or lab-based research methods.
- Solely conducting interviews and surveys rely on user recall, which historically is not accurate
- You get to see things you wouldn’t anticipate and uncover small details that have become habitual and invisible to the participant. You can see the interruptions, illogical processes, and superstitious behaviors that directly influence UX work

Why conduct contextual inquiry?

Contextual inquiry is not especially useful for targeted design tasks like testing a newsletter signup form on a website or redesigning a product webpage. These types of interfaces are fairly straightforward: they don’t typically require in-depth thought processes or an underlying body of knowledge that UX professionals must understand in order to design them

When contextual inquiry is not useful

Contextual inquiry is based on 4 principles:

- Context: The researcher should observe in the natural environment where the user typically works, avoiding labs or conference-rooms settings
- Partnership: The user and researcher are partners in the process of understanding the work. Both parties should be free to direct the conversation toward what needs to be considered
- Interpretation:  The researcher should produce a comprehensive and shared interpretation for all important aspects of the work, aided by feedback from the user
- Focus: The researcher should understand the purpose of the research project and what information is needed. This understanding guides the observation and the interviews during sessions

Grounding principles of contextual inquiry

Use this 4-part structure as a template to guide your contextual inquiry session:

- The primer
- The transition
- The contextual interview
- The wrapup

Contextual inquiry session structure

- Participants default into interview mode: Participants might begin to treat the session like a tell-all, which is what contextual inquiry seeks to avoid. Remind participants that you are interested in the fine details of their work, so they should complete it as they normally would, without you there.
- The session turns into an airing of grievances: Participants may feel you are looking for their feedback on all the problems with the system, which can turn into a presentation of their frustrations. In this situation, you should redirect the user to work as they normally would and explain the reasoning behind their actions.
- You may bring your own biases to the session: Be purposeful about leaving all your previous understanding about the work behind you and go into the research with an open mind, treating everything you learn with the same level of importance.
- You may bias the user: During the session, the participant may adjust their process to fit into the discussion or your interpretations. Make sure to stress that users should always work as they normally would and favor open-ended conversation that allows them to fill in the blanks for you.

Risks of contextual inquiry

- real-life problems
- typical equipment users have
- details about work space
- hardware preferences (ex: mouse vs. trackpad vs. touchscreen)
- collaboration and resource sharing
- additional tools

Types of Information in Contextual Inquiries

Contextual inquiry is a type of ethnographic field study that involves in-depth observation and interviews of small samples of users to gain a deep understanding of work practices and behaviors. Typically, it is conducted during the early discovery stages for a new feature or product. 
Key definitions:
- Context: The research takes place in the users’ natural environment as they conduct their activities the way they normally would. The context could be in their home, office, or somewhere else entirely
- Inquiry: The researcher watches the user as she performs her task and asks for information to understand how and why users do what they do

Contextual inquiry is useful for many domains, but especially well suited for considering users’ interactions with complex systems and in-depth processes as well as the point of view of expert users.

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

Research methods used by researchers to collect qualitative or quantitative data in studies.

Data collection methods in UX research

- Contextual Inquiry

The study will be conducted in the natural environment of the participants. For example, if the participants are students, the environment would be their classroom instead of an office.

Ethnographic field studies in UX research 

https://www.nngroup.com/articles/contextual-inquiry/

Contextual Inquiry: Inspire Design by Observing and Interviewing Users in Their Context

User surveys

Contextual inquiry

Users are accompanied one-on-one with a researcher in a lab setting, and are told to complete tasks on a product or service.

Usability-Lab Studies

Participants contribute to the study by presenting their ideal experiences with reasons. The necessary design elements and creative materials will be provided by the researchers.

Participatory Design

"Tightly scripted usability studies are performed with several participants, using precise and predetermined measures of performance."

Usability Benchmarking

Researchers conducting usability testings remotely, with tools "such as screen-sharing software and remote control capabilities."

Moderated Remote Usability Studies

Having users install research moderator tool software on their devices and observe their process/thoughts while they complete a task.

Unmoderated Remote Panel Studies

Open and/or close ended information issued by a chosen set of users via a feedback link, button, form, or email.

Customer Feedback

Researchers invite random site visitors to answer questions about their goals of using the website and their feedback. Researchers then observe their subsequent behavior.

True-Intent Studies

Researchers observe user behavior through the recording of screens or pages that users click or see. "It requires the site to be instrumented properly or the application to have telemetry data collection enabled."

Clickstream Analysis

It could be either a quantitative method or a qualitative method. "Participants are offered different visual-design alternatives and are expected to associate each alternative with a set of attributes selected from a closed list."



Desirability Studies

- Focus groups bring together a variety of users to facilitate discussion in a group interview about a product, service, or brand.
- The focus group data should be analyzed with the attention to the logic that participants use to arrive at conclusions. The goal is to find out trends by looking at the occurring topics.

Focus Groups

User's Experience Measurements

Qualitative Data

A research method where a researcher in a structured setting asks an individual questions about any given topic for the purpose of collecting data about that topic.  From a UX perspective, interviews are valued insofar as they solicit the real opinions and experiences that users have when interacting with any given site or system, and the information collected can help improve that system. 

User Interviews

Tree testing focuses on evaluating category labels. This type of study is called "tree" testing because it is assessing hierarchical menus. It is often implemented remotely and unmoderated, and primarily used to follow up card sorting. It also identifies if Information Architecture (IA) structure, labels, and placements align with users’ expectations.

Tree Testing 

A Card Sort is used to understand how people think information within a website should be organized and named. It is often used to create or design an information architecture. 

- In a typical card sorting session, participants group the given topics into categories that make sense to them. 
- Users may also make changes to the cards you provided them by: removing a card they find unnecessary, creating a new card, renaming a card, changing the definition of a given card, and/or placing cards they feel belong that to multiple categories. 
- This can be carried out using sticky notes, paper cards, or a card sorting software.


Card Sorting in UX Research

A qualitative research method where participants log interactions and information related to a specific context over a period of time. Researchers give participants a device to record their lives related to the studied products. 




Diary/Camera Studies in UX Research

Conducted after figuring out your target users. It uses a prototype to explore how a user will use a product. You can use a real user or someone on the design team can act as the user. There will be another colleague that will record any difficulties or concerns raised by the team. A guideline for the walk-through can also be created. This is different from usability testing as it is not used to test hypotheses or part of the rigorous iterative design process.

Walk-throughs in UX Research

A questionnaire is a form designed to collect information from respondents through a series of questions. A variety of question types can be included such as open-ended, multiple choice, or a scale (e.g. On a scale of 1-5, rate your satisfaction with this product).

Learn Before

Related

Learn After