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Everything you need to know: human error in UX design
A psychological insight on identifying, classifying and handling Human Errors.
One of the parameters which determine the quality of a product experience is undoubtedly the number of mistakes the user makes. These generate friction and frustration, finally producing an Experience being far from excellence.
In order to avoid the occurrence of errors throughout the use of a given product, it is crucial to understand how to identify and classify mistakes through psychological principles and theories. Once learned the dynamics and the cognitive processes at the basis of errors, it is possible to deploy effective strategies to reduce the probability of user error occurrence, therefore improving usability.
The aim of this article is to provide the essential psychological knowledge to manage and prevent a user from making mistakes during a use cycle of a product, through a process of identification, classification and troubleshooting of those events, finally aiming to maximize the efficiency of a product and its User Experience.
However, even though psychological theories explained in this article are largely approved, they do not represent the absolute truth. In addition, as the “Human Error” is an unexpected, unwanted and special condition, potentially caused by unlimited sources, it is possible to state that it is ultimately unpredictable. Moreover applying specific methodologies and relying on precise psychological theories minimize the occurrence of those conditions, not preventing them completely.
The Step Zero
In order to clearly understand the point at which a mistake occurs, rather than imagining scenarios while designing, the best thing to do is probably User-Testing. Through that practice it is possible to observe the whole cycle of actions that leads to an error or a misunderstanding, getting a wider vision of the complete scenario in which it occurred. In addition, user testing might show how the specific user-target faces precise problems, challenging some assumption (that could have been) made before and building experiences. It is crucial, during this step, to test the product on a target as similar as possible to the final one, as…
