The Aesthetic-Usability Effect

pay attention not only to what users say, but also to what they do.

Let’s imagine we’re facilitating a qualitative usability-test session. We observe the participant struggling through a few tasks on a site, but their final feedback is a vague comment on the attractiveness of the interface.

Whenever we hear this kind of feedback that seems out of place, we need to consider three possibilities:

• The participant might

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For example, during a usability-testing study, a participant encountered many issues while shopping on the FitBit site. The issues ranged from minor annoyances in the interaction design to serious flaws in the navigation. She was able to complete her task, but with difficulty.

However, in a post-task questionnaire, she rated the site’s ease of use v... See more