Method for Semi-Automated Evaluation of User Experience Using Brain Activity

There is a large interest in user experience today, both from a usability and accessibility
point of view. However, in order to verify what the users actually like and don't like, user testing
must be conducted. Traditionally, user experience is measured retrospective with surveys and
interviews, but this is not the most optimal approach since it does not measure user experience in
the moment and it is prone for human error because of our inaccurate memory recollection. Here
we propose a method that does semi-automated evaluation of user experience by utilizing
electrophysiological equipment that monitors electrical activity of the brain. We describe an
approach that together with brain activity monitoring will collect and quantify user experience in a
non-intrusive manner. We demonstrate the method by showing how a low cost device can record
brain activity during a user test, and auto-detect where the user has difficulties understand or
navigating a solution. All this is done in an unsupervised manner, but an observer must still verify
the feedback with the actual user to remove false positives. Our method is not limited to digital
solutions and can also be used for evaluating user experience of physical installations.