Lumosity
RESEARCH METHODS
Interview (one-on-one)
Usability testing
Video Content Analysis (Behavioral)
MEMBERS
Nicola Law: UX Research Lead
Chengcheng Liu: UX Design
Ruby Wu: UX Research and Design
TIMEFRAME
Oct 30 2019
—
Dec 11 2019
TOOLS
Adobe XD
Notability
SUMMARY
This UX project used interview, usability testing, and video content analysis to uncover current users' experience problems in the brain training mobile application, Lumosity. Our re-designed prototype addressed the major inconsistencies in the interaction and design affordances that hindered users’ learning journey and motivation in continued using this training app.
APPLICATION BACKGROUND & GOAL
Lumosity is a brain training mobile application that was launched in 2007 and has over 75 million users across the world by the time of our research. The application offers 6 different languages: English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, and German. Lumosity ranks high in both Apple App Store (4.6 stars with 74.9K ratings) and Google Play store (4.5 stars, 245K ratings). Despite its popularity among the brain training application, we have noticed concerns from current Lumosity users.
For the purpose of this project, we explore the current user experience of the app and focus on improving the user experience of the app. The design of the actual game mechanics is out of the scope of this project; hence, our user experience testing does not focus on whether they improve cognitive training or not.
UX RESEARCH PROCESS
We conducted an iterative design and research throughout the project. As the research lead, I designed the following 6-steps qualitative research study. This report will emphasize my role in the research design, collection, and analysis of this project.
Before conducting the research, we did thorough research on the target audience of the current Lumosity app and thematized the characteristics of the targeted audiences into two personas. As we can see, our target audience spread from youth to middle age groups, and their common characteristics are to train their cognitive skills in simple and less time-consuming ways. These two personas served as the guide for our two target user types.
For the purpose of this research, we selected people who satisfied the characteristics of our target audience and did not have prior knowledge and experience on Lumosity for the most authentic reflection. A total of seven participants were recruited in this study.
1
Pre- Semi Structured Interview. As users did not have prior knowledge or experience of Lumosity, we interviewed their expectations and goals of the cognitive training game to establish the baseline of each user.
2
Usability Testing on the Original Lumosity game session, video recorded. This user testing aims to understand the overall user experience of the original Lumosity game - what were some positive user experiences and where did users have negative experiences (frustrated, unable to move on, etc.)? Users were asked to download the game on their own devices.
3
Post- Semi Structured Interview. It evaluated the game experience through the users’ perspectives. Questions were comparable to the pre-interview questions that we can assess if Lumosity has met user expectations. To assess users’ motivation in continuing playing this game, we did the post-interview twice, right after the gameplay and a week of the gameplay. The second post-interview addresses additional questions related to the continuation of the game.
We used ground theory in analyzing the pre-and post- interview answers and coding users’ behaviors from the video recorded usability testing. The behavior findings have been categorized into 5 themes that revealed where users experienced frustration. Specifics are shown in the following illustrations.
Incoherent association between icon/picture and explanation
Inconsistency on the match of images and games.
Instructional designs on demonstrating how to play were unclear, which increased users’ cognitive load
Accessibility concerns color contrast, font size, background choices.
Limited users’ choice in performing certain tasks (i.e. skip tutorials on familiar games).
Too many challenges/noises in the game interfaces to locate information
In the second post-interview, which occurred one week after the gameplay, we found that only one user had played the game on a daily basis for a week. Other users explained a lack of interest after the first day, even for those who played more games on the same day after the interview. They also expressed the lack of sense of community (i.e. playing with others, leaderboard) in the game. From the time of our research, we noticed that Lumosity did offer a connecting with a friend option; however, this feature was a premier feature that needed to be paid. Our users had a negative impression of the idea that connecting with friends was considered an expensive function.
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4
Based on the behavior video analysis, we created a journey map with one of the personas we created to illustrate this type of target audience’s user experience journey on the original Lumosity app.
5
Once we developed the lo-fi prototype, we conducted the card sorting method to further clarify the category of each function in the game.
6
Usability testing was conducted for our Hi-Fi prototype. Findings show that users were very satisfied with the overall experience flow, and all of them felt the interface offers them a claim feeling. They also expressed, explicitly, that they liked the color scheme and the color matching. Overall, our redesign addresses all the main problems that were found in the initial user testing (original Lumosity app). However, we found some areas of improvement.
Offering affordance to increase user control. For example, in the tutorial section, the same instruction below was consistently shown on the screen. For those who might not need to refer to the information and want to focus on the game, we offer the option for them to swipe the instruction down in the iterated version.
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The home page reflects three design improvements to address problems occurring in the user testing - consistency with color-coding, explanation of the graphic icons, and motivational cues.
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Specifically, we changed the format for the date display, making it less confusing for users, as they might consider the old format as the scores of gameplay. We made sure all colors in the circular icons for game categories are consistent with the All Game section. And we labeled the next practices section, making it clear which categorical games they will encounter next. We also make clear that they have control in switching games users want to play next. To trigger and sustain users’ motivation in playing Lumosity, we designed a section called Persona Growth, which allows users to visualize their game experience. Following the Goal-orientation Theory, we allow users to set their goals for the next game to foster their motivation and agency.
TAKEAWAY
Listening to users is great practice, but users might not be able to reflect on their true feelings. Behavioral analysis becomes an important part to add another layer of understanding of how users feel about the product.
Having both interview and behavioral data helps us in understanding users only when we can see both data objectively. When looking at the behavioral data, we need to learn not to bring assumptions from the interview data (which could be hard sometimes).
Reflecting from the new normal, pandemic period. Experiencing the difficulties in doing research during the pandemic, I reflected on this project and learned that I should wear my empathy hat all the time when employing similar research methods at this specific time. Not everyone faces life in a simple and easy way. All the “noises”’ - unstable internet during interviews, people talking, babies crying in the background - should all be considered into redesigning the experience. We do not create a better experience TO humans; we do it FOR them. We should think about how to solve their problems in context to their daily lives.
