How Quantitative Research Helps UX By Tory Darling, Codal Inc
______________________________________________________ As a UX design agency, the research and data you collect is critical in making the right adjustments to your website or mobile application. Utilizing data, both qualitative and quantitative is necessary to in order to optimize the experience for the user. Although both of these methods are necessary, there needs to be a larger emphasis on the quantitative research by UX designers. More importantly, utilizing data received in interviews or focus groups and applying that to research methods for obtaining quantitative data is a great strategy to use. There is a great need to back up a small sample size of qualitative data with a large size of quantitative in order to prove trends and behaviors of users. Why have a greater emphasis on quantitative research In order to obtain the goal of these research methods, to describe the population in the best possible way, a significant sample size needs to be measure. Due to the fact that majority of the time resources and lack of time are constraints in majority of projects, a UX company needs to incorporate more qualitative data methods in the process in order to capture and test a larger sample size. Quantitative research is usually attempting to understand how many or how much of a specific behavior or answer to a question. This quantified data point then allows the researcher establish trends in the data; trends that ultimately show how the general population of user’s behave and feel about the particular website or mobile application. Why qualitative research is valuable in UX design The most important distinction between the two methods of research is primarily to deal with the reliability of the data. Although that is not to say both are not necessary. Quantitative data cannot exist without qualitative data, as to the qualitative data is useless without being applied in a quantitative sense. As a UX design company, only going with one method is not sufficient. But rather, it is the combination of both that really provide the insight one needs to make decisions.
How to effectively use quantitative data In efforts to collect usable quantitative data, Codal, a mobile app development agency in Chicago, typically collects the findings of many different methods into a total compliment of results, and then cross-checks the results for each in order to create an accurate representation of the target audience. The Codal team uses a number of practices, including card sorting, usability testing, and surveys to compile large sums of sample data. Conclusion Using trends found in qualitative UX research methods will help establish a foundation for quantitative research. It is just as critical to understand the why and how, as it is to understand the how many and how much. In UX research, they go hand in hand. Looking for more insight on UX design services? Are you wanting to develop an app and you need to know the cost to develop an app is? Visit Codal’s blog, or come talk to us here! We’d love to hear from you.
Codal Inc App Development & UX Design Agency www.codal.com