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Read everyday objects, apps, doors, signs, counters, and rooms for the behaviors they invite or block. Use ideas like affordances, signifiers, mapping, feedback, constraints, defaults, and the “Norman door” to see design decisions hiding in plain sight.
Watch what someone is trying to accomplish, not just what they touch or click. Separate the person’s goal from the surrounding context: time pressure, location, tools, social setting, rules, and interruptions.
Follow a person’s path through a service such as getting a prescription, filing a claim, checking in for travel, or ordering food. Spot the handoffs, waiting points, repeated information, channel switches, and invisible work that shape the experience.
Apply the previous explanations in a guided problem.
Look at forms, applications, signs, eligibility rules, deadlines, and required documents as designed experiences. Reason through how wording, order, defaults, proof requirements, and missing options make some actions easy and others difficult.
Use hesitation, errors, repeated steps, confusion, waiting, and workarounds as clues about where design is creating effort. Distinguish physical friction, mental load, emotional stress, and administrative burden so the problem is easier to see.
Check your understanding with a short quiz.
Trace what happens after people use a product, service, space, form, or policy. Ask who succeeds, who is excluded, what behavior is nudged, and what unintended effects appear around access, privacy, safety, trust, and fairness.
Write observation notes that separate what you saw, what you inferred, and what solution ideas popped up. Practice staying with evidence long enough to describe the situation clearly before trying to fix it.
Review this chapter with practice based on your mistakes.
