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Do I know you? Exploring the possibilities of crowdsourcing to elect empathy

Josje van Beusekom TU Delft

December 2011

ABSTRACT This paper describes an explorative research on the use of crowdsourcing to help designers gain empathy for their users. Current immersion in users’ life is done by expensive and time consuming fields work. The increased use of the web offers an easy and fast alternative to reach real users. In this paper I explore the possibilities of using websites that track users by screen recording. The results show interesting opportunities provided by these sources.

Keywords Crowdsourcing, screen recording, empathy, design, immersion.

Theme nr 17. Crowdsourcing rich user insights

INTRODUCTION The need for user involvement and gaining empathy is widely recognized in user centered design practice [e.g., 1,2]. Especially in the early conceptual phase user involvement is beneficial for designers to gain empathy with the users that is designed for [2]. Empathy is gaining a deep understanding to get related to the user more than knowing about them [2]. Trying to gain empathy means to step into the user’s life, observe, ask, wander around, and to step out of their life again. This step into the users’ life is called ‘immersion’ [2] (see figure 1).

To gain real empathy, this immersion phase is really important. However to be able to design a suitable product a designer needs the curiosity in the discovery phase to be open for new insights during the immersion and the designer needs to connect it to own experiences.

Literally stepping into one’s life is the best way for designers to gain empathy [3]. Unfortunately, this is often heavily time consuming and quite expensive. It requires expertise and is therefore often outsourced to specialized agencies. This is contrary to the trend that designers should also be researchers who know their users much better than designers who got their

information from a research team [5]. Research agencies try to involve the designers more and more in parts of their research to help them gaining empathy but it is often hard to get them on the same levels to where the researchers are. It would be most useful for designers to gain empathy by doing their own research, following the whole process from the curiosity for the insights to the (maybe unconscious) comparison to their own situation when creating the task.

Introducing designers to their users by video has potential in situation where time and budget are limited [3]. It elects more empathy than photo or text but only when the designer is willing and motivated [3].

On the other side there is the internet that keeps on providing opportunities to look for and share information. An interesting upcoming technique that makes use of the web is called ‘crowdsourcing’. With this technique the general public can contribute to a call from a company. Small tasks are provided by the crowdsourcing platform which can be accomplished by any user of the web. Due to the variety of tasks there are all kinds of users who participate by choosing the assignment that fits their interest. At the moment it is mainly used to measure the usability of user interfaces or to provoke creative ideas. However, crowdsourcing might offer suitable new opportunities to get access to users and elect empathic feeling among designers by immerging them in their lives instead of researchers.

This study explores two platforms on the possibilities of gaining empathy by gathering video information from users. They were selected because of their screen recording technique and they provided the opportunity to do a test for free. Both websites are normally focusing on websites testing.

The current study elaborates on a study from Tidball [4] who collected inspiring pictures on the web in different ways to create user-centered designs. He focused on the richness and personal connection that could be gained via this channel. This study elaborates on that with the idea that video information can create a larger personal connection as it shows the user’s face together with its voice. It explores the differences between both sources and the differences in comparison to immersing field work. How do designers react and interpret the videos? What is the quality of the information? What provides most empathy? Could designers do the research themselves?

Figure 1. Four steps of gaining empathy.

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METHOD This study was conducted in two parts. In the first part the researcher created a call on two platforms and harvested the information. In the second part designers were involved to judge the information on its quality and effectiveness of electing empathy. They were also asked to compare it to regular immersing field research.

Data Collection The aim was to collect one entry from both platforms that would create more empathy than pictures. To begin, a task was created on ‘awesomeness of your kitchen’.

1. Usertesting.com: Make a video of your kitchen telling what makes it so awesome. First film yourself and introduce who you are.

To create an assignment on usertesting.com an e-mail address was created where participants could send their video to with use of wetransfer.com. The screen recording facility was only used to guide participants to the wetransfer website. Participants were offered 8£.

Whatusersdo.com created the task themselves; they commented that participants might feel limited or uncomfortable expressing themselves on video when trying to keep in time. As it was an explorative study, an alternative way of gaining information could be used:

2. Whatusersdo.com: Take 3 pictures: 1of yourself and 2 of your kitchen. Upload them on the computer, start screen recording, introduce who you are and explain why your kitchen is awesome.

With screen recording participants were able to open the pictures and point to specific parts on the pictures with their mouse (see picture 3, red circles) while telling about it. Participants were offered 10$.

Both sites only allowed one participant for the task who needed to possess a digital camera. Usertesting.com offered the option to filter on sex, age category, country and internet experience. Within 1 hour both tests were completed (see figure 2 and 3).

Data analysis In the second part of the study two designers individually examined the empathy they felt for both users. The designers both had an academic background and experience in immersion in users’ life. 1 of them was female.

The designers were shown both video’s and asked to comment on the level of empathy they felt. The short time span of the movies (5-6 minutes) allowed the designers to watch the entire videos. After the movies they had to pick the person they felt most empathy for and reflect on that choice. They were also asked to compare this method to regular ways of immersion in users’ life and explain if they preferred one above the other. They were not informed of how the video’s where collected until they had completed the task.

The designers’ comments were captured during the session and compared by the researchers. The most interesting quotes are represented in the result section.

RESULTS

The results capture both the researcher’s experience collection the empathizing material online and the comments of the designers on the level of empathy it gave them.

Collecting the Empathizing Material Online The process of collecting the video was new both for the researcher and the participants. In the assignments it was mentioned that this was an unusual task, users agreed with that but this did not stop them to complete the task. What is interesting to see in figure 2 is that she is holding a paper on the 4th picture with the text she is planning to say. This corresponds to the presumption whaterusersdo.com had on the difficulty for users to express themselves on video. For creating the task most time was spent on formulating the task in a way that made it stand out between the others and makes users curious enough to participate in it. In total it required about 15 minutes creating and 10-15 minutes analyzing. This was similar for both platforms.

An unpleasant surprise was the lack of sound of the

Figure 2(top). Fragments of the movie gained from usertesting.com. Figure 3 (bottom). Fragments of screen capture gained from whatusersdo.com

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usertesting.com video (figure 2) when she explained what she was showing. The voice recording from submitting the video on wetransfer did work and provided a small compensation to the lack of sound.

Compared to conducting usual field research the required time to gather the data is much lower. For regular immersion it would be good to spend at least an hour with the participant to gain a feeling of empathy. On the other hand is there a time laps in crowdsourcing between posting the task and receiving the result in this case one hour. Downloading the data is as easy as opening an e-mail. For a designer who is doing its own research this way it is unexpectedly exiting to wait for the data. Scary on one side because the direction users take cannot be influenced by questions, but interesting on the other side because the output can be totally unexpected similar to field research.

The used platforms might not be the most suitable platforms for the used method. Especially enabling the user to send the video is much more complicated that is has to be.

During the collection of the entries, the researcher noted some initial observations (see Table 1).

Designers’ Reactions The designers showed a clear preference for the photo, screen recording and voice recording method. The main topics are captured in the quotes in table 2.

Many of the comments describe what the designers like and dislike about the videos and what makes them able to empathy with the user. They also compare both videos to one another as well as to their regular way of doing immersing research.

The usertesting.com video (figure 2) was not highly rated because of the lack of sound. The designers were instructed to try to link the voice in the submission video to the kitchen movie, but this seemed extremely hard. Also the lack of quality by filming it with an iPhone (figure 2, last picture) lowered the rating. It made it annoying for the designers to look at and distracted them from getting a feeling for the user. Designers also found it difficult that this video did not show an overview of the kitchen, they could imagine how the kitchen would probably be, but this doubt

already gave them a lower empathic feeling. The overall video was described by one of the designers as

Table 2. Quotes from the designers’ analysis.

insufficient as it did not gave the feeling that he walked around in her kitchen.

Whatusersdo.com was preferred and it showed the designers preference for overview on the situation especially from different angles. Seeing the guy in its own kitchen made it feel real and the way he showed aspects of his kitchen with his arrow gave the designers the impression that he was really showing them around.

What lacked in both entries was the possibility to ask questions. When comparing it to common field research, this seemed another important aspect. Designers feel the need to ask for more details to prevent themselves from interpreting it from their own perspective. They both mentioned that they were inspired, informed and able to create a product that would fit but they would have asked more probing question to get to a deeper understanding.

CONCLUSION The results from this study support the use of crowdsourcing in gaining empathy with users in a fast and cheap way. Both methods provide enough raw data, real people and real context to virtually immerse in their lives and feel connected. It challenged the designers’ assumptions on ‘what makes an awesome kitchen’ and broadened their view.

Designers preferred the pictures with voice because it felt most real as it gave a clear overview of the situation. It also triggered more questions. Compared to immersion in users’ lives by fieldwork it evokes a lower level of empathy. However the level of empathy is still sufficient to inform and inspire designers to come to products that fit the user and it is more suitable in situations where budget and time are limited.

While the pictures were preferred, the video had potential to be more real according to the designers. As it was now, it mainly annoyed due to lack of sound and quality. This indicates how important these seemingly trivial aspects are in the rating of the designer. It was already predicted that sound would improve the

Source Researcher’s observations

Video (usertesting.com) Multiple focuses, no sound, bad quality, no overview, feels fake, voice doesn’t seem to match movie,

Photo’s + voice (whatusersdo.com)

Good overview, feels real, emphasize on window

Table 1. First observations from the researcher during the collection process.

“[video] It doesn’t feel like I’m in her kitchen”

“[pictures] I can see this person cooking his dinner”

“[video] the bad quality is annoying to look at”

“[video] It is hard to picture the whole as she only films parts”

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empathy level, but also a certain level of film/photo quality is required together with overview of the situation. Having higher quality videos with sound or ones that give a better overview of the situation will help to explore this potential.

Creating and analyzing a task requires little expertise which makes this method suitable for every designer. Especially for the relative rich insights it gives in the short time spent. Designers can easily conduct their own research to gain empathy for their users with a limited budget and amount of time. By following the whole process designers’ curiosity and own experiences are included which supports empathic feelings.

Additional information in electing empathy by crowdsourcing could be gathered by carrying out the research again with more participants. For the videotaping it is recommended to carry it out via a more suitable platform like openhallway.com or e-mail. Next to that it would be interesting to give designers a design task after they saw the data and make the users review the concepts.

REFERENCES 1. Leonard, D, Rayport, J.F., 1997. Spark

Innovation through Empathic Design. Harvard Business Review, 75(6), 102-113.

2. Kouprie, M., Sleewijk Visser, F., 2009. A framework for empathy in design: stepping into and out of the user’s life. Journal of Engineering Design, 20(5), 437-448.

3. Van Rijn, H., Sleewijk Visser, F., Stappers, P.J., Ozakar, A.D., 2011, Empathy with children with autism: a comparative study about informing designers by different sources of information. Draft article for CoDesign special issue.

4. Tidball, B., Mulder, I., Stappers, P.J., 2011, Inspiring Design: Exploring online sources of user-generated information. Conference proceedings 23 June 2011.

5. Stappers, P.J., Sleewijk Visser, F., Bringing participatory techniques to industrial design engineers. International conference on engineering and product design education, 2007, Newcastle.