User Personas: What are They, Why Are They Important, and How Does Psychology Play a Role
What is a Persona?
If you are a designer, like me, then you probably have heard of user personas. If not, I am here to explain the ins and outs of this design tactic that will make your process so much easier.
A user persona is a fictional person a designer creates to showcase the needs of users for their chosen design product. It is a way for the designer to connect with the users to ensure they will keep their audience in mind throughout the whole design process.
Personas are a vital step at the beginning of product development because it requires a deeper understanding of human behavior. This is where psychology plays a role in the development of personas. “Persona creation engages stakeholders by tapping into the underlying psychological mechanisms of representation and communication.” (“Theory of Personas: What Has Been Written About the Psychological Relationship Between Personas and Their Users?”)
What Are the Pieces That Make Up a User Persona?
First, it is important to establish basic demographics such as name, age, education, income, occupation, and marital status. These lay the groundwork for putting together a personal story that empathizes with that user’s particular needs. Thus, the users’ motivations, concerns, and behaviors become established, and the designer can start creating ideas.
Why Are Personas Important?
Once a concrete story about a person is created it breaks away from statistical data and research a designer has found and turns it into something more meaningful. It can shed the designer of their biases and provide reasoning behind important design decisions. (“Putting Personas to Work in UX Design: What They Are and Why They’re Important”). For example, the designer may want to create a monthly payment plan for their health app, but their user persona, Samantha, is extremely busy and forgetful and may need an automatic payment plan with reminders.
What Are the Different Types of Personas?
According to the Interaction Design Foundation, there are four main types of personas: goal-directed personas, role-based personas, engaging personas, and fictional personas.
Goal-Directed Personas
What is the goal of the user? Describe the user’s behaviors and ways they achieve their goal when using the product.
Role-Based Persona
Role-based personas are very similar to goal-directed personas. However, it focuses more on the user’s role in their environment. Where will the product be used? What is the purpose of the product?
Engaging Persona
Engaging personas focus on more than just behavior. They look at the person as a whole. Emotions, psychology, and backgrounds come into play to devise a story, so the persona is as real as possible.
Fictional Personas
Lastly, fictional personas are unlike the other types because it doesn’t derive from user research. Instead, it is based on past experiences and interactions with the product that the designer creates. Utilize this type of persona with caution because thy are not as accurate of a guide in user development.
How is Psychology Connected to Personas?
According to The Persona Blog, there is psychological research that shows that naturally, people distribute themselves and others into categories. This can be seen through personas. It is the “idiosyncratic characteristics, in combination with the characteristics and values of the communities” that designers then interpret. (Theory of Personas: What Has Been Written About the Psychological Relationship Between Personas and Their Users?”) This process used by designers is what is known in social psychology as “person perception.”
Doing research to create user personas allows designers to take what they have learned to create something that can be applicable to real-life people. This is shown through experimental psychology (The Persona Blog). If the designer creates characteristics, goals, and attitudes for a person, they are more likely to be able to predict how that person will react and respond in certain situations. Overall, allowing them to anticipate their real-life users’ needs effectively.