Interview with Susan Weinschenk, Ph.D., Author of "Neuro Web Design"

Interview with Susan Weinschenk, Ph.D., author of “Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click?” and Chief of Technical Staff at Human Factors International

Today’s interview is with a person who has been pushing the realm of usability into the unconscious, so to speak.

Susan Weinschenk’s research and book on how the unconscious mind works in decision making processes, and how that impacts web site interactions is important information for any web developer. Why?

Because by understanding the principles impacting unconscious decisions, a web developer can create a web site or application that supports these unconscious decision-making processes, which ultimately makes for a better, more streamlined experience.

1. What is your background? Where did you go to school and what did you study?

I have a Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from Penn State. I started at Virginia Tech (2 years) then moved to Boston and worked during the day as a secretary and finished my bachelors in psychology at night from Northeastern University. After that was Masters and Ph.D. at Penn State. I specialized in the brain even back then… did my Ph.D. research on the left and right hemispheres.

2. How did you first get involved in usability?

In grad school I took my first computer programming course. This was way way back… before there were PCs… even before there were screens! I ran my first program using cards as input and out came a piece of paper that said, “Job Aborted.” Right then I knew that ordinary people would not be able to use computers that were this socially inept!

I began to study psychology applied to technology design. I didn’t realize that it was an actual field (human factors) until several years later when I accidentally found out about a consulting firm that was doing usability work (the word usability wasn’t really being used back then, it was called “human factors”).

Since then I’ve critiqued, designed and re-designed: many “legacy” character based applications (we didn’t call them legacy back then — they were state of the art!), many GUI applications, web applications, web sites, printer interfaces, screens on copy machines, medical devices, and even a washing machine and a microwave.

3. What is it about usability that you most like, or find rewarding?

I’m a psychologist at heart. I love thinking about, researching and designing for humans, wondering; “how will people react to this?” It’s rewarding to research users and the tasks they are trying to do and then design an interface that really works for them.

4. As Chief of Technical Staff for Human Factors International, how do you use your skills in psychology and neuro web design to make a difference for the company and your clients?

I try to keep up on the latest information in the field and transmit that to my staff who are out there working very hard every day designing for clients.

And I also do speaking and writing on Persuasion, Emotion, and Trust (PET) and my book Neuro Web Design, in order to raise the awareness level of how the new insights and research on unconscious mental processing can be applied to design more persuasive web sites.

5. Should students interested in a usability career consider a degree in psychology, why or why not?

Well, I’m a little biased! For me the basic premise behind usability is what makes people tick… and knowing about people helps immensely in doing the work.

But people come to usability from many backgrounds and they can all be successful. If you don’t have a psychology background I do think it helps to read up on the foundational research that underlies the usability principles we implement.

6. In your book “Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click?” you discuss the unconscious and how it influences decisions. Why should web designers understand and use this information?

The latest research in psychology is showing us most mental processing of information occurs unconsciously. So if you want to understand what will make users make a decision or take an action you have to know about unconscious decision making.

For example, customer ratings at a web site are very powerful because they are an example of the principle of social validation. Research in social validation shows that in times of uncertainty we look to others to decide what to do. This is why customer ratings at a web site are so powerful.

And if you combine those ratings with “mini-personas”, like ebags does, where each customer gives a brief description of who they are and how they used the product (“Kathy Jones, 37, frequent business traveler) then you are combining the principle of similarity (we listen to people we think are like us) with social validation. Then the customer reviews are even more influential.

So if you understand these principles of unconscious mental processing you can build more persuasive web pages.

7. Social media usage across the world is exploding, how does neuro web design influence social media?

People are social animals. They will always take whatever the latest technology is and figure out how to make it social. Social media is intertwined with many of the principles in Neuro Web Design.

Take for example, reciprocity. Most social media makes use of the fact that if you do something for me (follow me on twitter, “poke” me on facebook) then I will feel a drive to do something similar to/for you.

8. What’s coming up next for you? What are you looking forward to working on?

What a great question. I don’t think anyone has asked me this in any of the interviews I’ve been doing… Let’s see… I’d like to write some more books, and, as always keep reading the research. Anyone have any ideas on what my next book should be?

Thank you Susan!

The study of Persuasion, Emotion and Trust and how web sites can use PET in designing a better experience has taken off in the past year or so. And when it comes to persuasion and Neuro web design, Susan Weinschenk wrote the book, literally!

Susan’s book; “Neuro Web Design: What Makes Them Click?” is available now at Amazon or your favorite bookseller.