Abstract

As a whole, this book delivers what it sets out to deliver: a solid, comprehensive guide for practitioners of user research. The second edition has responded to the rapid pace of contemporary business by thoroughly revising chapters and adding new ones that reflect best practices in recent user research. In addition, the book comes with a website that extends the text's offerings to include reference materials, additional best practices and tools for user research, and items such as user consent forms and checklists. Quite possibly, this text and accompanying website might not be all that attractive to the specialist who has conducted years of advanced study into the user experience. To be fair, though, the authors of Observing the User Experience did not set out to write a manual for specialists. Their goal was to create a guide for those who are relatively new to user research or who find that their positions now require knowledge of user research. For this audience, Goodman, Kuniavsky, and Moed's book succeeds, and fulfilling the authors' prediction, these readers will likely pull this book from the shelf when they must observe the user experience.