Usability studies with children and teenagers are as valuable as any other user research, but require special attention to both participant recruiting and study facilitation. You can't act the same with kids as you would with adults.
Age groups differ in how they use websites, the internet, and computers. Our findings from studying teenagers are contrasted with our other user research with children and adults: user experience designers should target their designs based on target audience behavior patterns.
To guarantee an effective study with users under 18-years old, recruit extra participants, design a child-friendly lab, prepare a plethora of age-appropriate tasks, and avoid being too authoritative.
North American parents are concerned with technology’s impact on children’s social and emotional development, Chinese parents worry about health and academics
Teens are (over)confident in their web abilities, but they perform worse than adults. Lower reading levels, impatience, and undeveloped research skills reduce teens’ task success and require simple, relatable sites.
Designers should consider the physical and mental abilities of children, as well as utilize existing UX conventions. Here are 3 guidelines to consider when designing UX for children, based on our user research with users aged 3-12 years.
New research with users aged 3–12 shows that children have gained substantial proficiency in using websites and apps since our last studies, though many designs are still not optimized for younger users. Designing for children requires distinct usability approaches, including targeting content narrowly for children of different ages.
Children’s cognitive skills are still developing, so their reasoning abilities are weaker than those of adults. To help them successfully use an interface, designs should display clear, specific instructions, leveraging kids’ mental models and prior knowledge.
As kids’ physical development throughout childhood changes, so do their physical abilities, constraints, and device preferences. Touch gestures such as swiping and tapping big targets are easy for all children, but fine mouse or trackpad gestures such as dragging are hard for young kids.
Social media use has altered how Millennials think about friendships and relationships. This impact stands as a valuable reminder of the consequences of UX-design decisions.
An effective university website can increase conversions for prospective students and alumni, strengthen institutional credibility and brand, improve user satisfaction, and save the university time and money.
Members of the often misunderstood Millennial generation exhibit unique behaviors and approaches to digital interfaces. They are confident and error prone, and they have high expectations of websites.
18-to-25-year olds gave slightly higher ratings of flat designs than older adults did. That increased aesthetic appeal may not be worth the cost of flat design.
As the new largest generation in the American workforce, Millennials are subject to rampant speculation, investigation, and even some moral panic. These young adults have high expectations about user interfaces and are confident in their skills, but they’re error prone and their tendency to multitask reduces their task efficiency.
Browser tabs separate the stages of collection and comparing and serve as memory aids to keep many alternate pages available for consideration as users are shopping or researching. 7 UX guidelines support this user behavior, which is particularly common among younger users.
Usability studies with children and teenagers are as valuable as any other user research, but require special attention to both participant recruiting and study facilitation. You can't act the same with kids as you would with adults.
Age groups differ in how they use websites, the internet, and computers. Our findings from studying teenagers are contrasted with our other user research with children and adults: user experience designers should target their designs based on target audience behavior patterns.
Designers should consider the physical and mental abilities of children, as well as utilize existing UX conventions. Here are 3 guidelines to consider when designing UX for children, based on our user research with users aged 3-12 years.
To guarantee an effective study with users under 18-years old, recruit extra participants, design a child-friendly lab, prepare a plethora of age-appropriate tasks, and avoid being too authoritative.
North American parents are concerned with technology’s impact on children’s social and emotional development, Chinese parents worry about health and academics
Teens are (over)confident in their web abilities, but they perform worse than adults. Lower reading levels, impatience, and undeveloped research skills reduce teens’ task success and require simple, relatable sites.
New research with users aged 3–12 shows that children have gained substantial proficiency in using websites and apps since our last studies, though many designs are still not optimized for younger users. Designing for children requires distinct usability approaches, including targeting content narrowly for children of different ages.
Children’s cognitive skills are still developing, so their reasoning abilities are weaker than those of adults. To help them successfully use an interface, designs should display clear, specific instructions, leveraging kids’ mental models and prior knowledge.
As kids’ physical development throughout childhood changes, so do their physical abilities, constraints, and device preferences. Touch gestures such as swiping and tapping big targets are easy for all children, but fine mouse or trackpad gestures such as dragging are hard for young kids.
Social media use has altered how Millennials think about friendships and relationships. This impact stands as a valuable reminder of the consequences of UX-design decisions.
An effective university website can increase conversions for prospective students and alumni, strengthen institutional credibility and brand, improve user satisfaction, and save the university time and money.
Members of the often misunderstood Millennial generation exhibit unique behaviors and approaches to digital interfaces. They are confident and error prone, and they have high expectations of websites.
18-to-25-year olds gave slightly higher ratings of flat designs than older adults did. That increased aesthetic appeal may not be worth the cost of flat design.
As the new largest generation in the American workforce, Millennials are subject to rampant speculation, investigation, and even some moral panic. These young adults have high expectations about user interfaces and are confident in their skills, but they’re error prone and their tendency to multitask reduces their task efficiency.
Browser tabs separate the stages of collection and comparing and serve as memory aids to keep many alternate pages available for consideration as users are shopping or researching. 7 UX guidelines support this user behavior, which is particularly common among younger users.
Students are multitaskers who move through websites rapidly, often missing the item they come to find. They're enraptured by social media but reserve it for private conversations and thus visit company sites from search engines.
