Transcript
Formulate better hypothesesFor a more effective Abductive Design
Carmen Brion | @Tea_monsterUX Oxford and DOPM | 10-05-2016
Abductive design takes the best guess
Abductive Reasoning
● Starts with an incomplete set of observations
● Forms hypotheses making a prediction based on the information you have at the moment
● Goes from an observation to a theory that frames the most likely explanation for the observation
Contrary to popular opinion - Sherlock Holmes rarely, if ever, deduces anything. He may occasionally induce something, but most of the time he infers the best explanation from his observations. Source
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Hypotheses make design research collaborative and targeted
Facilitates teams to:
● Discuss and align about the problems to solve
● Separate assumptions from facts
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Where hypotheses fit within the design framework?
Formulating hypotheses
It is not an easy task
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This is not a hypothesis, it is just a description of how pagination works.
If online shoppers use pagination then they will have more items to explore
If online shoppers use pagination then they the likelihood of buying increase
If online shoppers use pagination then they will have different pages of items to explore
This is not a hypothesis, states a fact and it is not worth investigating
This is a hypotheses but uses a solution as independent variable and it’s too vague
Poor hypotheses are worse that no hypotheses
Like poor research, give teams a false sense of going in the right direction.
Bad hypotheses lead to
● Designing the wrong experiments● Ambiguous data coming out of the
research ● Results are difficult to interpret and
translate into outcomesPicture by Quinn Dombrowski
To learn to formulate good hypotheses
We need to go back to the scientific method
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How to make hypotheses sound
The good hypotheses:
1. Are simple and unambiguous2. Have a dependent and an
independent variables3. State a clear, unique relationship
between these 2 variables, based on some evidence/guess
4. Are testable, measurable, falsifiable and positive
Anyone reading the hypotheses should be able to understand the context and clearly interpret the results.
Picture by Gerry Lauzon
Pagination is a solution and this limits the outcomes of the research
Diverge
Converge
Having the independent variable as the solution makes us converge too early and limits what we can find out in the research.
Converge
Diverge
Having the independent variable solution-free makes the research divergent. The results will help to understand the whys behind this relationship and define the solution that fits better.
If online shoppers use pagination then their likelihood of buying increases
If we give online shoppers a bigger amount of attractive items then their likelihood of buying will increase
Understand where you are in product development journey
Who is the audience? What are their problems/needs? How can we solve it? What’s the best solution?
Who are the personas?Are there potential new personas? What are the Job To Be Done?What are their key behaviours?
What are the personas problems?What are their pains and frustrations?
How can we solve these problems? What are the barriers and/or constraints?
How different solutions solve the problems? How the different solutions fit with the personas mental model?
Which solution is better? How is the chosen solution working? What is the impact to the personas?
Generative Research
Evaluative Research
“Find the root cause, don’t just put a plaster over the symptoms”
Generative research hypotheses templates
Audience Problems Solutions
We believe that [this persona(s)] are a potential new audience because of [this reason]
We believe that [this persona(s)] will behave this way because of [this reason]
We believe that [this persona(s)] with these goals have [this job to be done]
We believe that [this persona(s)] have [this problem] [achieving this goal] because of [this reason]
We believe that [this persona(s)] have [this pain/frustration] [achieving this goal] leading to this [consequence]
We believe that [this problem] will be solve [with this solution] that will result in [this outcome]
We believe that [this persona(s)] using [this solution] will result in [this outcome]
We believe that [this solution] will result in [this change in the persona(s) mental model/behaviour]
“Ask the right questions to get insights that lead to the right solutions”
Evaluative research hypotheses templates
Solution
If we provide [this solution] then [this persona(s)] will be able to achieve [this outcome] and results in [this improvement]
If [this solution] is the best solution for [this persona(s)] to achieve [this outcome] as a results we will see [this improvement]
If-then hypotheses are more suited for evaluative research. However, we can improve them to make sure they meets the good hypotheses requirements.
Hypotheses will evolve as we run research and we learn more about the audience needs
We believe that fashion shoppers need more items in a category because they are looking for inspiration
We believe that fashion shoppers find it hard navigating a great amount of content
We believe that we can help fashion shoppers finding items they want to buy by relating their search to their lifestyle
If the Fashion category has lifestyle articles then the likelihood of fashion shoppers to add 1 or more items to the basket will increase a 20%
Abductive Design
Research Framework
Picture by Alex Alishevskikh
Steps to formulate, test and assess hypotheses
Determine the type of questions to answerDo we need evaluative or generative research?
Determine questionsWhat do we know, don’t know and what are the problems/constraints
Determine assumptions
Formulate hypothesesFollowing the guidelines
Prioritise the hypothesesWhich ones are more risky if they were wrong?
Design the researchTo assess the prioritised hypotheses
Run the research
Assess hypothesesValidate/invalidate hypotheses with the results of the research
Capture the learnings
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Use Test Cards from the Value Proposition Design
● State assumption ● Outline the task to test the assumption● Think how you are going to measure
success● Indicate what success means
Will increase the likelihood of fashion shoppers finding items of their interest.
Having a lifestyle filter
will be asked to find items With a regular filter and with the lifestyle filter
Participants will search
A 20% more of items added to the basket than regular filters
Lifestyle filters should achieve
Number of items they add to the basket
Use Learning Cards from the Value Proposition Design
● State assumption● Explain what was observed for this
assumption during the research sessions● Extract the learning ● Indicate the action to take in line with the
learning
Will increase the likelihood of fashion shoppers finding items of their interest.
Having a lifestyle filter
that are more attractive but fashion shopper might not add them to the basket because they want to try it first.
Lifestyle filters generate Items
the non-linear user journey to get fashion shopper back for items they had shown interest on.
The user journey is not linear.Lifestyle filters
Review how to address
For listening :)
“Few ideas work on the first try. Iteration is key to innovation”
― Sebastian Thrun
References
Hypotheses-led designhttp://www.trikro.com/downloads/playbookhttps://medium.com/@mwambach1/hypotheses-driven-ux-design-c75fbf3ce7cc#.x5z35d1mmhttps://www.thoughtworks.com/insights/blog/how-implement-hypothesis-driven-developmenthttp://www.slideshare.net/inusese/cindy-alvarez-embracing-hypothesis-driven-design
Scientific hypotheseshttp://www.wikihow.com/Write-a-Hypothesis
If you use hypotheses, please let me know how it goes.
Please feedback:● What works and how it has impacted your work● Any tips or cool stuff you would like to share when putting hypotheses into practice● What is hard to put into practice and what problems you are encountering
I am planning to keep working to make this work better, so I am planning to keep iterating these ideas and practices. Your ideas and feedback are always welcome, the more brains the better problem solving!
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