From the course: UX Insights Weekly

Unlock this course with a free trial

Join today to access over 22,600 courses taught by industry experts.

What is the think aloud protocol?

What is the think aloud protocol?

From the course: UX Insights Weekly

Start my 1-month free trial Buy for my team

What is the think aloud protocol?

“

- [Instructor] When you watch a participant in a usability study, it's easy to see what they're doing, but it's not always clear why they're doing it. The problem is, if you interrupt your participant to ask a question, you're taking their focus away from the task. And because they spent time to process your question and come up with an answer, it may be a justification that they make to explain their behavior rather than what they were truly thinking about at that time. But we can ask our participants to continuously think out loud as they use the product, saying what they're thinking as they move through each screen. This stream of consciousness talking is called think aloud protocol. So long as participants aren't consciously processing what they say, it doesn't interfere too much with the tasks they're doing and it gives us some insight into what areas of the screen they're paying to, and in what order. Here's…

Contents