The Design Psychologist | Psychology for UX, Product, Service, Instructional, Interior, and Game Designers

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What makes a product feel not just usable, but desirable?

In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Marty Gage, co-author of User Experience Research: Discover What Customers Really Want, about how teams can move beyond guessing and uncover the experiences people actually desire.

Marty shares a practical framework for connecting emotional needs to product strategy: desired emotional states, benefits, features, and sensory cues. They discuss why great design is not just about making something easy to use, but about understanding how people want to feel, what value they want from an experience, and what details communicate that value.

The conversation explores useful, usable, and desirable design, the meaning behind cues like simplicity, familiarity, organization, and accessibility, and how methods like collaging and contextual inquiry can help teams translate customer insight into actionable design direction.

If you want to build products and services that connect with people, align teams, and reduce the risk of guessing wrong, this episode offers a clear way to think about user experience research as the foundation for better innovation.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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How many users do you actually need for a usability study?

In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Laura Faulkner about one of the most repeated ideas in UX research: that five users are enough. Laura explains why that rule of thumb can be useful in some situations, but dangerous when teams treat it like a law.

They discuss sample size, research risk, stakeholder alignment, and why the real question is not “How many users?” but “What decision are we trying to support, and what happens if we miss something important?”

Laura also shares practical advice on making research more influential inside organizations: sharing early and often, treating research as community property, helping stakeholders take ownership of findings, and building a point of view from human data rather than personal opinion.

The conversation also explores synthetic users and AI, including where AI can help researchers think through test plans and where teams still need fresh data from real people.

If you want to design better studies, communicate findings with more impact, and help research actually change product decisions, this episode gives you a grounded, human-centered way to think about evidence, risk, and influence.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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What does it actually mean to say a product is usable?

In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Phil Kortum about the System Usability Scale, or SUS: one of the most widely used tools for measuring usability. They discuss why this 10-item questionnaire has lasted for decades, what makes a usability metric trustworthy, and how researchers can use SUS scores to compare products, track improvement, and communicate usability in a shared language.

The conversation covers why a number is not automatically objective, how SUS differs from measures like Net Promoter Score, when the positive version of SUS may be better to use, and why usability researchers still need effectiveness and efficiency measures alongside subjective ratings.

They also explore Phil’s work on voting systems, where usability is not just about convenience but whether people can successfully cast a vote.

If you want to understand how to measure human experience with more rigor, this episode gives you a clearer way to think about usability, evidence, and the difference between a score that sounds scientific and a metric you can actually trust.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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How do you know whether a product idea is worth building before you spend months designing and developing it?

In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Jaime Levy, author of UX Strategy, about how designers, researchers, founders, and product leaders can move beyond opinion and make a stronger evidence-based case for what to build.

Jaime explains why strategy is not about magically predicting the future, but about systematically reducing risk. She discusses how storyboards can help teams test the business idea before getting lost in interface details, why most companies compete in “purple oceans,” and how UX can become a source of real differentiation.

The conversation also gets into AI: where it can speed up strategy work, where it can mislead us, and why human judgment, critical thinking, and customer understanding matter even more as tools become more powerful.

If you care about building products people actually want, this conversation will help you think more clearly about value propositions, mental models, product differentiation, and the role of UX strategy in a rapidly changing world.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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Season 2 of The Design Psychologist is here.

After exploring the foundations of psychology across human factors, UX, instructional design, service design, game design, and more in Season 1, this season takes the conversation even further.

We’re asking some honest—and sometimes difficult—questions about where design psychology is today, the challenges professionals are facing in their careers, and how we can use design to create a better future.

Throughout Season 2, we’ll explore topics including accessibility, data visualization, helper robots, Jobs to Be Done vs. classical human factors methods, tools for expanding the power of the mind, and the growing role of AI.

You’ll also hear conversations with fascinating guests, including an author behind one of the most controversial and influential articles in UX research and a YouTube creator and memory expert.

And there are a few surprises along the way.

If you’re interested in psychology, design, UX, human factors, emerging technology, or simply understanding how people interact with the world around them, Season 2 has plenty to explore.

Welcome back to The Design Psychologist.

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What happens when human-centered design is no longer enough?

Designers are trained to make things easier to use—but what if ease and elegance are no longer the point? What if the systems we need to change go far beyond screens and interfaces, touching global structures and collective futures?

Our guest, Don Norman, coined the term "Norman Door" to describe a door that gives the wrong signal about how to open it—pull vs. push—highlighting poor affordances and feedback in everyday objects. 

This simple yet profound observation helped launch a new era of design awareness, making him one of the most influential voices in the psychology of design. His decades-long career has shaped the fields of human-computer interaction, design thinking, and usability. He is the author of the seminal book The Design of Everyday Things, and now, Design for a Better World, a work that challenges us to design for the full complexity of human and planetary needs.

WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE

• What makes some errors easy to catch and others dangerously hard to detect
• How decades of design decisions have shaped today’s global challenges
• What it means to shift from human-centered to humanity-centered design
• How co-design empowers communities over outside experts
• The surprising design lessons learned from nuclear accidents, faucets, and guinea pigs
• The role of failure in progress—and why we should embrace it
  
  

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Designing for ease is not enough—today’s challenges demand designing for systems and long-term impact.
• User-centered design can fall short when it fails to consider environmental, societal, and ethical dimensions.
• Human error is not always a failure of attention—it’s often a byproduct of bad design.
• To scale real change, we need dandelion models—spreading seeds of knowledge and training others to do the same.
• Participatory design ensures that communities are not passive recipients but active creators of their own solutions.
• The service economy offers a path toward sustainability—if companies rethink profit and longevity.

The future of design psychology isn’t about better buttons—it’s about understanding people so deeply that we can redesign society itself.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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 Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn. 

Why does social proof work?

And, what are some practical tips on how to use it to create better designs?

In part one of these Social Proof episodes, we started with the foundations of social psychology. We looked at the history, key studies, and some helpful frameworks.

Now in part two, we’re picking up where we left off—at the five-point framework I mentioned at the end of Part One. This is where things get practical. We’ll connect the social psychology research with actual strategies for implementing social proof. 

We’ll explore how social proof methods like testimonials, expert endorsements, and more, have an impact on our psychology, in particular, when we’re making buying decisions.

By the end, you’ll have a framework to decode social proof and a toolkit to apply it thoughtfully.

What You’ll Learn

• Five core psychological drivers— including our need to fit in, our fear of missing out, and so on  
• How social proof methods like testimonials, expert endorsements, and more, have an impact on our psychology, in particular, when we’re making buying decisions. 
• A framework to decode social proof and a toolkit to apply it thoughtfully. 

Key Takeaways

• We relate to other humans, and shared experiences matter.
• We want to fit in—and social proof taps into that drive.
• We trust experts when making decisions under uncertainty.
• We’re motivated by FOMO (fear of missing out).
• Imagination helps us take action when we see others doing the same.

These drivers explain why social proof works. We respond to stories, signals, and shared experiences because they tap into how our minds are wired.

We also explored how to use social proof in design. Whether it’s testimonials, expert endorsements, client logos, or user-generated content, each method works best when it feels real, relevant, and respectful. The goal isn’t to trick users—it’s to guide them with clarity, trust, and connection.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn. 

Have you ever been in a crowd where no one clapped until one brave soul started the applause? Or walked past two restaurants—one bustling with a line out the door, the other nearly empty—and felt pulled toward the busy one?

These small, everyday moments reveal something big: we are profoundly influenced by the people around us, often without even realizing it.

This episode kicks off a two-part deep dive into social proof, one of the most powerful concepts in social psychology. Over a century of research shows that humans are wired to pick up on social cues, and these cues quietly shape our behavior, decisions, and preferences.

In Part 1, you’ll learn:

• Why simply being around others can change how we perform.
• How reviews, testimonials, and follower counts tap directly into our social wiring.
• The fascinating story of a 19th-century psychology professor who first noticed how cyclists behaved differently when riding together.
• How social proof research has evolved from early experiments in social psychology to today’s social neuroscience.
• The key psychological principles that explain why social proof works.

This episode is about more than just marketing or design tricks—it’s about understanding the deep human need to notice, follow, and be influenced by others. By grasping the science, you’ll build a foundation for creating products, experiences, and messages that feel natural, trustworthy, and even irresistible.

What’s next:

In Part 2, we’ll move from theory to practice. You’ll get concrete methods and examples to put social proof to work in your own designs and projects.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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Why do so many user personas fail in practice, and what can we do about it?

Have you ever worked on a team where everyone had a different idea of who the user was? Or watched a beautifully crafted persona become ignored or misused? You're not alone. In this episode, we explore why traditional personas often fall short—and how alignment personas can change everything.

You'll learn how to cut through organizational chaos, align stakeholders, and get your team moving in the same direction. You'll also discover a fast, psychology-informed method to surface assumptions, prioritize goals, and build products that stay focused on what really matters.

Meet Our Guest: Tamara Adlin Tamara Adlin is a UX legend. She's the co-author of The Persona Lifecycle and The Essential Persona Lifecycle, played a key role in shaping Amazon's UX strategy, and now leads the charge with her new concept: alignment personas. Her work helps teams avoid derailment, align faster, and make smarter design decisions. She also hosts the podcast Corporate Underpants, tackling the organizational dynamics that show up in bad products.

What We Cover:

• Why personas started off strong—and where they went wrong
• What makes alignment personas radically different and more effective
• How executives act like "tornadoes" and what that means for your designs
• Why assumptions are more powerful than data—and what to do about it
• A five-step alignment process you can run in a single workshop
• Practical tools like the strategy wedge and purpose slide
• How to use design psychology on your own team to influence strategy

Key Takeaways:

• Most personas fail because they gather dust, get misused, or don’t align with actual business priorities.
• Executives often bring strong, unspoken assumptions. Unless you surface them, those assumptions will quietly shape everything your team builds.
• Data alone doesn’t change minds. But alignment personas help teams reveal what they believe—and align around it.
• You don’t need months of research. Just five conversations can expose misalignment, clarify direction, and build shared understanding.
• Design psychology isn’t just for users. It’s a powerful tool for navigating organizations, aligning teams, and protecting your product from chaos.

This episode is packed with real talk, powerful analogies (Greek gods and all), and methods you can use immediately. If you're ready to turn misalignment into momentum, this conversation with Tamara Adlin is your guide.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  

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Why are games so deeply engaging? What psychological principles make game design such a powerful tool for shaping attention, emotion, and learning?

Game design is not a niche skill. It's one of the most refined disciplines we have for designing attention, emotion, and motivation. If you're designing anything for people, game design can sharpen your craft.

 This episode reveals how the craft of game design can teach us to build more immersive, emotionally resonant experiences. Whether you're designing products, learning experiences, or interactive systems, the lessons from games can help you design for joy, focus, and transformation.

About Our Guest:
Jesse Schell is a legendary figure in game design. He’s designed games for Disney, pioneered virtual reality, built theme park attractions, created award-winning educational games, and teaches at Carnegie Mellon’s Entertainment Technology Center. His book, The Art of Game Design, is one of the most widely recommended texts in the field.

What You'll Hear:

• Why game designers focus on creating experiences, not just products
• The surprising power of introspection in understanding users
• How "toy-first" thinking leads to more meaningful play
• The science behind flow and how it keeps players engaged
• How to use emotional arcs and tension-release patterns in your designs
• Why gamification often fails—and what to do instead
• The psychology of challenge, curiosity, and fun
• What designers in other fields can borrow from games

Questions Explored:

• What is the difference between a toy and a game?
• How do we design for emotional resonance?
• Can introspection really be a reliable design method?
• What does it mean to balance choices and desires?
• Why is iteration crucial to creating fun?

Key Takeaways:

• Games are machines for generating experiences. That means the psychology of the player is central to every design decision.
• Designers must understand not just what people do—but why they feel, focus, and engage.
• Play is not trivial. It's one of the most powerful modes of learning and transformation.
• Flow, balance, and emotional arcs aren't just game design tools—they're experience design tools.

To make things more engaging, don’t just "gamify"—design for meaningful engagement.

If today’s conversation helped you think more deeply about your work, I’d love it if you left a quick rating or review on Apple, Spotify, or your favorite podcast listening app. It helps more thoughtful designers discover the show—and keeps these meaningful insights coming your way. Just a star rating or a sentence or two makes a big difference. Thanks for listening! 

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.