UX research is integral to the success of a digital product or service. Without it, you can’t be sure your users will have a positive experience. Understanding and empathizing with a user’s needs and desires and then applying those insights to the design process will guarantee success.
UX research is a multi-dimensional facet of a product’s usability and enjoyability. Consequently, it’s essential that you familiarize yourself with the most common duality within the UX research field. Specifically, the duality we shall address today is qualitative vs quantitative research.
By the time you’ve finished reading this article, you will have a complete understanding of quantitative and qualitative research methods.
The Difference Between Qualitative and Quantitative Research
Understanding the difference between qualitative and quantitative research is vital when it comes to knowing your prospective users.
Both research methods provide valuable insights into your users as individuals. However, which research method you choose will provide substantially different data regarding said users.
Below, we’ve explored the meanings of both qualitative and quantitive research and addressed their inherent differences.
Qualitative Research
Qualitative user research focuses on the acquisition and analysis of non-numerical data.
Qualitative data is subjective in nature, uncovering the motivations, emotions, thoughts, and attitudes of the selected participants.
This method of research aims to answer why users do what they do when they interact with a product. This helps UX researchers reveal users’ problems.
Research methods like user interviews and diary studies help to determine the usability and enjoyability of a digital product or service.
Quantitative Research
Quantitative user research focuses on objective, numerical, or statistical analysis.
Using a quantitative approach means that you’re trying to identify trends and formulate predictions surrounding your target demographic or topic.
Card sorting, A/B testing, and tree testing prove to be useful techniques when acquiring quantitative data. Therefore, the primary goal of quantitative studies is to help UX designers evaluate the effectiveness of their products. In doing this, quantitative data ultimately reveals areas for improvement.
Simply put, quantitative research aims to answer what the users actually do when they interact with a product.
A Summary of Quantitative vs Qualitative Research Differences
From this article’s previous sections, you may have noticed the critical difference between these research methods surrounding the data.
Quantitative data uses numbers and statistics to identify patterns in a target audience’s actions when using a product. As its name suggests, you should expect to garner quantifiable results that reveal correlations in a user’s satisfaction or dissatisfaction.
Comparatively, qualitative data provides an in-depth analysis of human behavioral patterns that you can’t express through numbers. Qualitative data stems from emotional and empathy-driven findings that help you better understand your target audience.
Qualitative studies will allow you to get inside your users’ minds and understand the psychological reasoning behind their actions. Through thematic analysis, you will identify patterns in environmental and sociological influences concerning how a user interacts with your product.
UX Research Methods: The Importance of Qualitative vs Quantitative Research
Understanding the difference between UX research methods is one thing. However, acquainting yourself with the importance of qualitative and quantitative research is equally crucial.
By recognizing the benefits of both research methods, you can ascertain which method will best serve your overarching goals.
We shall now uncover the respective advantages of the two most prevalent UX research methods.
The Advantages of Using Qualitative Research
- Qualitative research explores users’ attitudes and behaviors in great depth. The in-depth detail of qualitative data can reveal valuable insights regarding the views and actions of your users.
- Qualitative studies encourage spontaneous discussion, as it is not as strictly regimented as quantitative studies. Through this discussion, you can further contextualize your users and their interactions with your products.
- Qualitative data reveals a level of logical and emotional reasoning that numerical findings alone can’t explain.
- Qualitative research offers more flexibility within its approach. If the user doesn’t initially provide an incredibly useful insight, the interviewer can probe further with follow-up questions. In addition, the interviewer can also adapt their questions or change the setting to evoke more valuable responses from users.
- A researcher’s intuition comes into play when it comes to qualitative research. If your instincts gravitate towards a specific set of questions, you are free to be more speculative about investigative angles.
- Qualitative research is more concentrated. You can target specific sampling groups to gather meaningful insights from particular user types.
The Advantages of Using Quantitative Research
- Quantitative research produces data that is factual and verifiable. You predetermine your quantitative research goals, meaning that your research serves to test and confirm your initial hypothesis. Your only concern is to address the verifiability of your data; you aren’t determining the reasoning behind your data. For this reason, your data is not only purely logical but simple and easily controlled.
- You can complete quantitative research anonymously. This can provide some comfort for your users, who may not wish to divulge personal or sensitive information.
- There is an undeniable appeal of speed and efficiency concerning quantitative studies. Due to online tools such as Google Analytics or Mixpanel, the processing and analysis of data has never been quicker. Quantitative research’s value resides in its efficiency, even if you acquire data from larger sample sizes.
- Unlike qualitative methods, you don’t need to moderate quantitative studies directly. Quantitative research acquires asynchronous data through techniques like surveys and polls; thus, researchers can use their time on other activities.
- The nature of quantitative studies means that you remove any potential biases from your data. By eliminating personal biases, you can make reliable predictions and generalizations to a larger population outside of your initial sample.
- UX researchers can duplicate quantitative studies. Given the meticulously crafted nature of quantitative studies, other researchers can easily follow their published processes. When other researchers verify your processes and data, your studies appear more trustworthy when presented to stakeholders.
When To Use Qualitative vs Quantitative Research
Knowing which research method to use at one given time can save you valuable time and resources.
Furthermore, your choice of research method will significantly impact the data you will obtain. There will be times when qualitative data will better serve your research than quantitative data and vice versa.
Now, we shall examine why and when to use qualitative vs quantitative research.
When Should You Use Qualitative Research?
Simply put, qualitative research studies aim to understand and contextualize real-world interactions through observational techniques.
Qualitative research situates the main areas of improvement within a product’s design. Specifically, through this research, you can locate usability issues and work towards resolving said issues.
Additionally, given the intimate nature of qualitative research, you’ll be working with smaller sample sizes. As a result, qualitative research is more affordable.
Due to this affordability, you can conduct qualitative testing at any stage in the design process.
When Should You Use Quantitative Research?
Generally speaking, quantitative research is a deductive approach to determining the correlational and causal relationships between variables.
These variables are often behavioral or attitudinal in nature (with regard to the user’s beliefs, desires, and motivations). They also serve the purpose of testing your theories surrounding your products and users.
With this in mind, it is best to conduct quantitative research when you wish to test or confirm a theory. Additionally, you should use quantitative research to monitor a product’s usability over a given period, comparing it to competitors’ products.
Above all, you should use quantitive research to confirm if your final product requires a redesign.
Tip: Quantitative testing is best suited to a large sample size of users. Organizing large participant pools is often expensive and time-consuming. Thus, if you conduct your tests too early/too often, you risk making a costly mistake.
We recommend that you conduct quantitative research at the beginning or end of your design process.
Examples of Qualitative Research
There are several ways you can conduct qualitative research studies. Below, we shall explore the different techniques you can use to acquire qualitative data.
1. User Interviews
User interviews help you learn who your users are as individuals. By asking your users open-ended questions, you can determine their needs, values, and desires.
An effective user interview starts with a clear goal in mind and carefully selected interviewees. You should prepare dialogue-provoking questions prior to your interview.
During the interview, you should debrief the participant clearly and make the participant as comfortable as possible. By making easy-to-follow notes, you will collect valuable insights from every interview.
2. Focus Groups
A focus group refers to a moderated conversation between a group of participants, prompting them to discuss issues or concerns. These concerns should surround a specific topic/set of topics surrounding your product or products similar to yours.
Like user interviews, you should have a clear goal in mind and pre-prepared questions.
After having recruited suitable participants and found an appropriate setting, you should also provide your participants with a prototype.
Tip: Your notetaker should make notes on your product’s perceived usability, performance, visual design, and interactive content.
3. Usability Testing
Usability testing refers to the process of evaluating the effectiveness of a product by testing it on real users.
You will start usability testing by creating tasks that help you evaluate your users’ interactions with your product’s interface.
You will then recruit the appropriate participants and run moderated tests to gain useful insights into your product’s pain points.
After the testing is complete, you will then present your findings to your product team and stakeholders.
Examples of Quantitative Research
Like qualitative research, there is a vast array of techniques available to conduct quantitative studies. Here are the most popular techniques that UX researchers employ to obtain quantitative data.
1. Card Sorting
In a card sort, participants categorize information written on cards into different categories in a way that is comprehensible.
Through a card sort, you can see how prospective users may navigate through your product’s content.
Typically, you pick a set of topics based on the content you wish to implement into your product. You’ll then write those topics on different cards, shuffle them, and hand them to your users to sort.
You will then analyze patterns in your users’ actions to determine the navigational structure of your product.
2. A/B Testing
A/B testing is a method of comparison whereby your participants will evaluate two variations of your products. The goal of A/B testing is to determine which version of your product performs the best.
After determining the correct sample size and your goals for the test, you should choose only one variable for evaluation. If you have multiple variables during your test, you won’t be able to determine which variable influences your product’s performance.
After conducting enough tests, you should then ask your participants for feedback on your variations.
3. Five-Second Testing
Five-second testing is a simple usability test that will determine if your design effectively communicates its primary goal to users.
You will present your participants with a landing page/screen for five seconds. You will then ask follow-up questions to clarify your design’s effectiveness to improve your conversion rates.
We recommend that you use Lyssna so that you can conduct five-second testing with tagged responses and word cloud visualizations.
With Lyssna, you will uncover valuable insights regarding your users’ first impressions of your product.
UX Research: Prioritizing Your Users’ Needs, Pain Points, and Desires
Now that you have evaluated the importance of the two most utilized research methods, it’s time to apply your knowledge. Remember, no matter which UX research method you employ, you must prioritize the user’s needs and desires.
The key takeaway is that it’s essential to have a psychological understanding of your users. Actively seek out the emotions, mindsets, behaviors, and actions of your users. The more data you have, subjective or otherwise, brings you one step closer to creating an effective product or service.
Hopefully, regarding qualitative vs quantitative research, you’ll know exactly which method will provide the most appropriate data for your designs.
To examine the effects of unexcelled UX research methods in practice, look no further than Page Flows. Specializing in a range of different sectors, from music to Monzo, Page Flows excels at finding new, innovative solutions.
Page Flows has worked alongside over 1,000 happy customers from revered brands via our unparalleled user flow design decisions. Get started today to access our growing library of user flow recordings and finally stay up-to-date with current design trends.
