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Opportunities for AI in Accessibility
In reading Joe Dolson’s recent piece on the intersection of AI and accessibility, I absolutely appreciated the skepticism that he has for AI in general as well as for the ways that many have been using it. In fact, I’m very skeptical of AI myself, despite my role at Microsoft as an accessibility innovation strategist who helps run the AI for Accessibility grant program. As with any tool, AI can be used in very constructive, inclusive, and accessible ways; and it can also be used in destructive, exclusive, and harmful ones. And there are a ton of uses somewhere in the mediocre middle as well.
I’d like you to consider this a “yes… and” piece to complement Joe’s post. I’m not trying to refute any of what he’s saying but rather provide some visibility to projects and opportunities where AI can make meaningful differences for people with disabilities. To be clear, I’m not saying that there aren’t real risks or pressing issues with AI that need to be addressed—there are, and we’ve needed to address them, like, yesterday—but I want to take a little time to talk about what’s possible in hopes that we’ll get there one day.
Alternative text
Joe’s piece spends a lot of time talking about computer-vision models generating alternative text. He highlights a ton of valid issues with the current state of things. And while computer-vision models continue to improve in the quality and richness of detail in their descriptions, their results aren’t great. As he rightly points out, the current state of image analysis is pretty poor—especially for certain image types—in large part because current AI systems examine images in isolation rather than within the contexts that they’re in (which is a consequence of having separate “foundation” models for text analysis and image analysis). Today’s models aren’t trained to distinguish between images that are contextually relevant (that should probably have descriptions) and those that are purely decorative (which might not need a description) either. Still, I still think there’s potential in this space.
As Joe mentions, human-in-the-loop authoring of alt text should absolutely be a thing. And if AI can pop in to offer a starting point for alt text—even if that starting point might be a prompt saying What is this BS? That’s not right at all… Let me try to offer a starting point—I think that’s a win.
Taking things a step further, if we can specifically train a model to analyze image usage in context, it could help us more quickly identify which images are likely to be decorative and which ones likely require a description. That will help reinforce which contexts call for image descriptions and it’ll improve authors’ efficiency toward making their pages more accessible.
While complex images—like graphs and charts—are challenging to describe in any sort of succinct way (even for humans), the image example shared in the GPT4 announcement points to an interesting opportunity as well. Let’s suppose that you came across a chart whose description was simply the title of the chart and the kind of visualization it was, such as: Pie chart comparing smartphone usage to feature phone usage among US households making under $30,000 a year. (That would be a pretty awful alt text for a chart since that would tend to leave many questions about the data unanswered, but then again, let’s suppose that that was the description that was in place.) If your browser knew that that image was a pie chart (because an onboard model concluded this), imagine a world where users could ask questions like these about the graphic:
- Do more people use smartphones or feature phones?
- How many more?
- Is there a group of people that don’t fall into either of these buckets?
- How many is that?
Setting aside the realities of large language model (LLM) hallucinations—where a model just makes up plausible-sounding “facts”—for a moment, the opportunity to learn more about images and data in this way could be revolutionary for blind and low-vision folks as well as for people with various forms of color blindness, cognitive disabilities, and so on. It could also be useful in educational contexts to help people who can see these charts, as is, to understand the data in the charts.
Taking things a step further: What if you could ask your browser to simplify a complex chart? What if you could ask it to isolate a single line on a line graph? What if you could ask your browser to transpose the colors of the different lines to work better for form of color blindness you have? What if you could ask it to swap colors for patterns? Given these tools’ chat-based interfaces and our existing ability to manipulate images in today’s AI tools, that seems like a possibility.
Now imagine a purpose-built model that could extract the information from that chart and convert it to another format. For example, perhaps it could turn that pie chart (or better yet, a series of pie charts) into more accessible (and useful) formats, like spreadsheets. That would be amazing!
Matching algorithms
Safiya Umoja Noble absolutely hit the nail on the head when she titled her book Algorithms of Oppression. While her book was focused on the ways that search engines reinforce racism, I think that it’s equally true that all computer models have the potential to amplify conflict, bias, and intolerance. Whether it’s Twitter always showing you the latest tweet from a bored billionaire, YouTube sending us into a Q-hole, or Instagram warping our ideas of what natural bodies look like, we know that poorly authored and maintained algorithms are incredibly harmful. A lot of this stems from a lack of diversity among the people who shape and build them. When these platforms are built with inclusively baked in, however, there’s real potential for algorithm development to help people with disabilities.
Take Mentra, for example. They are an employment network for neurodivergent people. They use an algorithm to match job seekers with potential employers based on over 75 data points. On the job-seeker side of things, it considers each candidate’s strengths, their necessary and preferred workplace accommodations, environmental sensitivities, and so on. On the employer side, it considers each work environment, communication factors related to each job, and the like. As a company run by neurodivergent folks, Mentra made the decision to flip the script when it came to typical employment sites. They use their algorithm to propose available candidates to companies, who can then connect with job seekers that they are interested in; reducing the emotional and physical labor on the job-seeker side of things.
When more people with disabilities are involved in the creation of algorithms, that can reduce the chances that these algorithms will inflict harm on their communities. That’s why diverse teams are so important.
Imagine that a social media company’s recommendation engine was tuned to analyze who you’re following and if it was tuned to prioritize follow recommendations for people who talked about similar things but who were different in some key ways from your existing sphere of influence. For example, if you were to follow a bunch of nondisabled white male academics who talk about AI, it could suggest that you follow academics who are disabled or aren’t white or aren’t male who also talk about AI. If you took its recommendations, perhaps you’d get a more holistic and nuanced understanding of what’s happening in the AI field. These same systems should also use their understanding of biases about particular communities—including, for instance, the disability community—to make sure that they aren’t recommending any of their users follow accounts that perpetuate biases against (or, worse, spewing hate toward) those groups.
Other ways that AI can helps people with disabilities
If I weren’t trying to put this together between other tasks, I’m sure that I could go on and on, providing all kinds of examples of how AI could be used to help people with disabilities, but I’m going to make this last section into a bit of a lightning round. In no particular order:
- Voice preservation. You may have seen the VALL-E paper or Apple’s Global Accessibility Awareness Day announcement or you may be familiar with the voice-preservation offerings from Microsoft, Acapela, or others. It’s possible to train an AI model to replicate your voice, which can be a tremendous boon for people who have ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease) or motor-neuron disease or other medical conditions that can lead to an inability to talk. This is, of course, the same tech that can also be used to create audio deepfakes, so it’s something that we need to approach responsibly, but the tech has truly transformative potential.
- Voice recognition. Researchers like those in the Speech Accessibility Project are paying people with disabilities for their help in collecting recordings of people with atypical speech. As I type, they are actively recruiting people with Parkinson’s and related conditions, and they have plans to expand this to other conditions as the project progresses. This research will result in more inclusive data sets that will let more people with disabilities use voice assistants, dictation software, and voice-response services as well as control their computers and other devices more easily, using only their voice.
- Text transformation. The current generation of LLMs is quite capable of adjusting existing text content without injecting hallucinations. This is hugely empowering for people with cognitive disabilities who may benefit from text summaries or simplified versions of text or even text that’s prepped for Bionic Reading.
The importance of diverse teams and data
We need to recognize that our differences matter. Our lived experiences are influenced by the intersections of the identities that we exist in. These lived experiences—with all their complexities (and joys and pain)—are valuable inputs to the software, services, and societies that we shape. Our differences need to be represented in the data that we use to train new models, and the folks who contribute that valuable information need to be compensated for sharing it with us. Inclusive data sets yield more robust models that foster more equitable outcomes.
Want a model that doesn’t demean or patronize or objectify people with disabilities? Make sure that you have content about disabilities that’s authored by people with a range of disabilities, and make sure that that’s well represented in the training data.
Want a model that doesn’t use ableist language? You may be able to use existing data sets to build a filter that can intercept and remediate ableist language before it reaches readers. That being said, when it comes to sensitivity reading, AI models won’t be replacing human copy editors anytime soon.
Want a coding copilot that gives you accessible recommendations from the jump? Train it on code that you know to be accessible.
I have no doubt that AI can and will harm people… today, tomorrow, and well into the future. But I also believe that we can acknowledge that and, with an eye towards accessibility (and, more broadly, inclusion), make thoughtful, considerate, and intentional changes in our approaches to AI that will reduce harm over time as well. Today, tomorrow, and well into the future.
Many thanks to Kartik Sawhney for helping me with the development of this piece, Ashley Bischoff for her invaluable editorial assistance, and, of course, Joe Dolson for the prompt.
I am a creative.
I am a creative. What I do is alchemy. It is a mystery. I do not so much do it, as let it be done through me.
I am a creative. Not all creative people like this label. Not all see themselves this way. Some creative people see science in what they do. That is their truth, and I respect it. Maybe I even envy them, a little. But my process is different—my being is different.
Apologizing and qualifying in advance is a distraction. That’s what my brain does to sabotage me. I set it aside for now. I can come back later to apologize and qualify. After I’ve said what I came to say. Which is hard enough.
Except when it is easy and flows like a river of wine.
Sometimes it does come that way. Sometimes what I need to create comes in an instant. I have learned not to say it at that moment, because if you admit that sometimes the idea just comes and it is the best idea and you know it is the best idea, they think you don’t work hard enough.
Sometimes I work and work and work until the idea comes. Sometimes it comes instantly and I don’t tell anyone for three days. Sometimes I’m so excited by the idea that came instantly that I blurt it out, can’t help myself. Like a boy who found a prize in his Cracker Jacks. Sometimes I get away with this. Sometimes other people agree: yes, that is the best idea. Most times they don’t and I regret having given way to enthusiasm.
Enthusiasm is best saved for the meeting where it will make a difference. Not the casual get-together that precedes that meeting by two other meetings. Nobody knows why we have all these meetings. We keep saying we’re doing away with them, but then just finding other ways to have them. Sometimes they are even good. But other times they are a distraction from the actual work. The proportion between when meetings are useful, and when they are a pitiful distraction, varies, depending on what you do and where you do it. And who you are and how you do it. Again I digress. I am a creative. That is the theme.
Sometimes many hours of hard and patient work produce something that is barely serviceable. Sometimes I have to accept that and move on to the next project.
Don’t ask about process. I am a creative.
I am a creative. I don’t control my dreams. And I don’t control my best ideas.
I can hammer away, surround myself with facts or images, and sometimes that works. I can go for a walk, and sometimes that works. I can be making dinner and there’s a Eureka having nothing to do with sizzling oil and bubbling pots. Often I know what to do the instant I wake up. And then, almost as often, as I become conscious and part of the world again, the idea that would have saved me turns to vanishing dust in a mindless wind of oblivion. For creativity, I believe, comes from that other world. The one we enter in dreams, and perhaps, before birth and after death. But that’s for poets to wonder, and I am not a poet. I am a creative. And it’s for theologians to mass armies about in their creative world that they insist is real. But that is another digression. And a depressing one. Maybe on a much more important topic than whether I am a creative or not. But still a digression from what I came here to say.
Sometimes the process is avoidance. And agony. You know the cliché about the tortured artist? It’s true, even when the artist (and let’s put that noun in quotes) is trying to write a soft drink jingle, a callback in a tired sitcom, a budget request.
Some people who hate being called creative may be closeted creatives, but that’s between them and their gods. No offense meant. Your truth is true, too. But mine is for me.
Creatives recognize creatives.
Creatives recognize creatives like queers recognize queers, like real rappers recognize real rappers, like cons know cons. Creatives feel massive respect for creatives. We love, honor, emulate, and practically deify the great ones. To deify any human is, of course, a tragic mistake. We have been warned. We know better. We know people are just people. They squabble, they are lonely, they regret their most important decisions, they are poor and hungry, they can be cruel, they can be just as stupid as we can, because, like us, they are clay. But. But. But they make this amazing thing. They birth something that did not exist before them, and could not exist without them. They are the mothers of ideas. And I suppose, since it’s just lying there, I have to add that they are the mothers of invention. Ba dum bum! OK, that’s done. Continue.
Creatives belittle our own small achievements, because we compare them to those of the great ones. Beautiful animation! Well, I’m no Miyazaki. Now THAT is greatness. That is greatness straight from the mind of God. This half-starved little thing that I made? It more or less fell off the back of the turnip truck. And the turnips weren’t even fresh.
Creatives knows that, at best, they are Salieri. Even the creatives who are Mozart believe that.
I am a creative. I haven’t worked in advertising in 30 years, but in my nightmares, it’s my former creative directors who judge me. And they are right to do so. I am too lazy, too facile, and when it really counts, my mind goes blank. There is no pill for creative dysfunction.
I am a creative. Every deadline I make is an adventure that makes Indiana Jones look like a pensioner snoring in a deck chair. The longer I remain a creative, the faster I am when I do my work and the longer I brood and walk in circles and stare blankly before I do that work.
I am still 10 times faster than people who are not creative, or people who have only been creative a short while, or people who have only been professionally creative a short while. It’s just that, before I work 10 times as fast as they do, I spend twice as long as they do putting the work off. I am that confident in my ability to do a great job when I put my mind to it. I am that addicted to the adrenaline rush of postponement. I am still that afraid of the jump.
I am not an artist.
I am a creative. Not an artist. Though I dreamed, as a lad, of someday being that. Some of us belittle our gifts and dislike ourselves because we are not Michelangelos and Warhols. That is narcissism—but at least we aren’t in politics.
I am a creative. Though I believe in reason and science, I decide by intuition and impulse. And live with what follows—the catastrophes as well as the triumphs.
I am a creative. Every word I’ve said here will annoy other creatives, who see things differently. Ask two creatives a question, get three opinions. Our disagreement, our passion about it, and our commitment to our own truth are, at least to me, the proofs that we are creatives, no matter how we may feel about it.
I am a creative. I lament my lack of taste in the areas about which I know very little, which is to say almost all areas of human knowledge. And I trust my taste above all other things in the areas closest to my heart, or perhaps, more accurately, to my obsessions. Without my obsessions, I would probably have to spend my time looking life in the eye, and almost none of us can do that for long. Not honestly. Not really. Because much in life, if you really look at it, is unbearable.
I am a creative. I believe, as a parent believes, that when I am gone, some small good part of me will carry on in the mind of at least one other person.
Working saves me from worrying about work.
I am a creative. I live in dread of my small gift suddenly going away.
I am a creative. I am too busy making the next thing to spend too much time deeply considering that almost nothing I make will come anywhere near the greatness I comically aspire to.
I am a creative. I believe in the ultimate mystery of process. I believe in it so much, I am even fool enough to publish an essay I dictated into a tiny machine and didn’t take time to review or revise. I won’t do this often, I promise. But I did it just now, because, as afraid as I might be of your seeing through my pitiful gestures toward the beautiful, I was even more afraid of forgetting what I came to say.
There. I think I’ve said it.
User Research Is Storytelling
Ever since I was a boy, I’ve been fascinated with movies. I loved the characters and the excitement—but most of all the stories. I wanted to be an actor. And I believed that I’d get to do the things that Indiana Jones did and go on exciting adventures. I even dreamed up ideas for movies that my friends and I could make and star in. But they never went any further. I did, however, end up working in user experience (UX). Now, I realize that there’s an element of theater to UX—I hadn’t really considered it before, but user research is storytelling. And to get the most out of user research, you need to tell a good story where you bring stakeholders—the product team and decision makers—along and get them interested in learning more.
Think of your favorite movie. More than likely it follows a three-act structure that’s commonly seen in storytelling: the setup, the conflict, and the resolution. The first act shows what exists today, and it helps you get to know the characters and the challenges and problems that they face. Act two introduces the conflict, where the action is. Here, problems grow or get worse. And the third and final act is the resolution. This is where the issues are resolved and the characters learn and change. I believe that this structure is also a great way to think about user research, and I think that it can be especially helpful in explaining user research to others.
Use storytelling as a structure to do research
It’s sad to say, but many have come to see research as being expendable. If budgets or timelines are tight, research tends to be one of the first things to go. Instead of investing in research, some product managers rely on designers or—worse—their own opinion to make the “right” choices for users based on their experience or accepted best practices. That may get teams some of the way, but that approach can so easily miss out on solving users’ real problems. To remain user-centered, this is something we should avoid. User research elevates design. It keeps it on track, pointing to problems and opportunities. Being aware of the issues with your product and reacting to them can help you stay ahead of your competitors.
In the three-act structure, each act corresponds to a part of the process, and each part is critical to telling the whole story. Let’s look at the different acts and how they align with user research.
Act one: setup
The setup is all about understanding the background, and that’s where foundational research comes in. Foundational research (also called generative, discovery, or initial research) helps you understand users and identify their problems. You’re learning about what exists today, the challenges users have, and how the challenges affect them—just like in the movies. To do foundational research, you can conduct contextual inquiries or diary studies (or both!), which can help you start to identify problems as well as opportunities. It doesn’t need to be a huge investment in time or money.
Erika Hall writes about minimum viable ethnography, which can be as simple as spending 15 minutes with a user and asking them one thing: “‘Walk me through your day yesterday.’ That’s it. Present that one request. Shut up and listen to them for 15 minutes. Do your damndest to keep yourself and your interests out of it. Bam, you’re doing ethnography.” According to Hall, “[This] will probably prove quite illuminating. In the highly unlikely case that you didn’t learn anything new or useful, carry on with enhanced confidence in your direction.”
This makes total sense to me. And I love that this makes user research so accessible. You don’t need to prepare a lot of documentation; you can just recruit participants and do it! This can yield a wealth of information about your users, and it’ll help you better understand them and what’s going on in their lives. That’s really what act one is all about: understanding where users are coming from.
Jared Spool talks about the importance of foundational research and how it should form the bulk of your research. If you can draw from any additional user data that you can get your hands on, such as surveys or analytics, that can supplement what you’ve heard in the foundational studies or even point to areas that need further investigation. Together, all this data paints a clearer picture of the state of things and all its shortcomings. And that’s the beginning of a compelling story. It’s the point in the plot where you realize that the main characters—or the users in this case—are facing challenges that they need to overcome. Like in the movies, this is where you start to build empathy for the characters and root for them to succeed. And hopefully stakeholders are now doing the same. Their sympathy may be with their business, which could be losing money because users can’t complete certain tasks. Or maybe they do empathize with users’ struggles. Either way, act one is your initial hook to get the stakeholders interested and invested.
Once stakeholders begin to understand the value of foundational research, that can open doors to more opportunities that involve users in the decision-making process. And that can guide product teams toward being more user-centered. This benefits everyone—users, the product, and stakeholders. It’s like winning an Oscar in movie terms—it often leads to your product being well received and successful. And this can be an incentive for stakeholders to repeat this process with other products. Storytelling is the key to this process, and knowing how to tell a good story is the only way to get stakeholders to really care about doing more research.
This brings us to act two, where you iteratively evaluate a design or concept to see whether it addresses the issues.
Act two: conflict
Act two is all about digging deeper into the problems that you identified in act one. This usually involves directional research, such as usability tests, where you assess a potential solution (such as a design) to see whether it addresses the issues that you found. The issues could include unmet needs or problems with a flow or process that’s tripping users up. Like act two in a movie, more issues will crop up along the way. It’s here that you learn more about the characters as they grow and develop through this act.
Usability tests should typically include around five participants according to Jakob Nielsen, who found that that number of users can usually identify most of the problems: “As you add more and more users, you learn less and less because you will keep seeing the same things again and again… After the fifth user, you are wasting your time by observing the same findings repeatedly but not learning much new.”
There are parallels with storytelling here too; if you try to tell a story with too many characters, the plot may get lost. Having fewer participants means that each user’s struggles will be more memorable and easier to relay to other stakeholders when talking about the research. This can help convey the issues that need to be addressed while also highlighting the value of doing the research in the first place.
Researchers have run usability tests in person for decades, but you can also conduct usability tests remotely using tools like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, or other teleconferencing software. This approach has become increasingly popular since the beginning of the pandemic, and it works well. You can think of in-person usability tests like going to a play and remote sessions as more like watching a movie. There are advantages and disadvantages to each. In-person usability research is a much richer experience. Stakeholders can experience the sessions with other stakeholders. You also get real-time reactions—including surprise, agreement, disagreement, and discussions about what they’re seeing. Much like going to a play, where audiences get to take in the stage, the costumes, the lighting, and the actors’ interactions, in-person research lets you see users up close, including their body language, how they interact with the moderator, and how the scene is set up.
If in-person usability testing is like watching a play—staged and controlled—then conducting usability testing in the field is like immersive theater where any two sessions might be very different from one another. You can take usability testing into the field by creating a replica of the space where users interact with the product and then conduct your research there. Or you can go out to meet users at their location to do your research. With either option, you get to see how things work in context, things come up that wouldn’t have in a lab environment—and conversion can shift in entirely different directions. As researchers, you have less control over how these sessions go, but this can sometimes help you understand users even better. Meeting users where they are can provide clues to the external forces that could be affecting how they use your product. In-person usability tests provide another level of detail that’s often missing from remote usability tests.
That’s not to say that the “movies”—remote sessions—aren’t a good option. Remote sessions can reach a wider audience. They allow a lot more stakeholders to be involved in the research and to see what’s going on. And they open the doors to a much wider geographical pool of users. But with any remote session there is the potential of time wasted if participants can’t log in or get their microphone working.
The benefit of usability testing, whether remote or in person, is that you get to see real users interact with the designs in real time, and you can ask them questions to understand their thought processes and grasp of the solution. This can help you not only identify problems but also glean why they’re problems in the first place. Furthermore, you can test hypotheses and gauge whether your thinking is correct. By the end of the sessions, you’ll have a much clearer picture of how usable the designs are and whether they work for their intended purposes. Act two is the heart of the story—where the excitement is—but there can be surprises too. This is equally true of usability tests. Often, participants will say unexpected things, which change the way that you look at things—and these twists in the story can move things in new directions.
Unfortunately, user research is sometimes seen as expendable. And too often usability testing is the only research process that some stakeholders think that they ever need. In fact, if the designs that you’re evaluating in the usability test aren’t grounded in a solid understanding of your users (foundational research), there’s not much to be gained by doing usability testing in the first place. That’s because you’re narrowing the focus of what you’re getting feedback on, without understanding the users’ needs. As a result, there’s no way of knowing whether the designs might solve a problem that users have. It’s only feedback on a particular design in the context of a usability test.
On the other hand, if you only do foundational research, while you might have set out to solve the right problem, you won’t know whether the thing that you’re building will actually solve that. This illustrates the importance of doing both foundational and directional research.
In act two, stakeholders will—hopefully—get to watch the story unfold in the user sessions, which creates the conflict and tension in the current design by surfacing their highs and lows. And in turn, this can help motivate stakeholders to address the issues that come up.
Act three: resolution
While the first two acts are about understanding the background and the tensions that can propel stakeholders into action, the third part is about resolving the problems from the first two acts. While it’s important to have an audience for the first two acts, it’s crucial that they stick around for the final act. That means the whole product team, including developers, UX practitioners, business analysts, delivery managers, product managers, and any other stakeholders that have a say in the next steps. It allows the whole team to hear users’ feedback together, ask questions, and discuss what’s possible within the project’s constraints. And it lets the UX research and design teams clarify, suggest alternatives, or give more context behind their decisions. So you can get everyone on the same page and get agreement on the way forward.
This act is mostly told in voiceover with some audience participation. The researcher is the narrator, who paints a picture of the issues and what the future of the product could look like given the things that the team has learned. They give the stakeholders their recommendations and their guidance on creating this vision.
Nancy Duarte in the Harvard Business Review offers an approach to structuring presentations that follow a persuasive story. “The most effective presenters use the same techniques as great storytellers: By reminding people of the status quo and then revealing the path to a better way, they set up a conflict that needs to be resolved,” writes Duarte. “That tension helps them persuade the audience to adopt a new mindset or behave differently.”
This type of structure aligns well with research results, and particularly results from usability tests. It provides evidence for “what is”—the problems that you’ve identified. And “what could be”—your recommendations on how to address them. And so on and so forth.
You can reinforce your recommendations with examples of things that competitors are doing that could address these issues or with examples where competitors are gaining an edge. Or they can be visual, like quick mockups of how a new design could look that solves a problem. These can help generate conversation and momentum. And this continues until the end of the session when you’ve wrapped everything up in the conclusion by summarizing the main issues and suggesting a way forward. This is the part where you reiterate the main themes or problems and what they mean for the product—the denouement of the story. This stage gives stakeholders the next steps and hopefully the momentum to take those steps!
While we are nearly at the end of this story, let’s reflect on the idea that user research is storytelling. All the elements of a good story are there in the three-act structure of user research:
- Act one: You meet the protagonists (the users) and the antagonists (the problems affecting users). This is the beginning of the plot. In act one, researchers might use methods including contextual inquiry, ethnography, diary studies, surveys, and analytics. The output of these methods can include personas, empathy maps, user journeys, and analytics dashboards.
- Act two: Next, there’s character development. There’s conflict and tension as the protagonists encounter problems and challenges, which they must overcome. In act two, researchers might use methods including usability testing, competitive benchmarking, and heuristics evaluation. The output of these can include usability findings reports, UX strategy documents, usability guidelines, and best practices.
- Act three: The protagonists triumph and you see what a better future looks like. In act three, researchers may use methods including presentation decks, storytelling, and digital media. The output of these can be: presentation decks, video clips, audio clips, and pictures.
The researcher has multiple roles: they’re the storyteller, the director, and the producer. The participants have a small role, but they are significant characters (in the research). And the stakeholders are the audience. But the most important thing is to get the story right and to use storytelling to tell users’ stories through research. By the end, the stakeholders should walk away with a purpose and an eagerness to resolve the product’s ills.
So the next time that you’re planning research with clients or you’re speaking to stakeholders about research that you’ve done, think about how you can weave in some storytelling. Ultimately, user research is a win-win for everyone, and you just need to get stakeholders interested in how the story ends.
Olympian Ilona Maher Starts Her Day in the Most Relatable Way Possible
Celebs, they’re just like us!
Mermaid pose (Eka Pada Rajakapotasana in Sanskrit) is a graceful and challenging yoga posture that beautifully combines flexibility, strength, and balance. It’s a deep hip opener that also targets your spine, chest, and shoulders, making it an all-encompassing pose for building strength and flexibility.
But starting from the ground up is key in mermaid pose, according to Heather Stants, a yoga and movement teacher and the creator of Dance Flow Yoga. Like any advanced yoga pose, it requires a thoughtful approach and proper preparation.
Ahead, we share exactly how to do mermaid pose, its benefits, ways to modify it or kick it up a notch, and more.
How to do mermaid pose the right way every time
Before diving into mermaid pose, it’s essential to warm up properly and approach the pose with mindfulness. Stants advises.
Time should be spent on lengthening the hip flexors and practicing back-bending postures, like camel pose (Ustrasana), before attempting the full bind in mermaid (where you link your hands together at the top of the move). Always listen to your body and respect your limits, she says.
- Start in downward-facing dog (Adho Mukha Svanasana). Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose (Kapotasana). Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and clasp your hands together, creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
The benefits of mermaid pose
1. It opens up your hips and shoulders
Mermaid pose offers a deep stretch for your hip flexors, quadriceps, and shoulders, enhancing overall flexibility. Stants highlights that the pose helps with lengthening your hip flexors and making other back-bending postures more accessible, which is helpful preparation for more advanced postures.
2. It strengthens your core and back
The pose requires significant core engagement, helping to build stability and strength in your torso. A strong core translates to better posture, reduced risk of injury, and an easier time lifting and carrying heavy objects (think: groceries, moving boxes, etc.) in your everyday life.
3. It improves balance
Holding the pose demands focus and balance, which can improve coordination and stability in other yoga poses. Not to mention, it can make daily tasks like leaning over to tie your shoes, walking up and down stairs, and reaching up to grab something on the top shelf easier.
Tips to modify mermaid pose
1. Use a strap
If you can’t reach your foot with your hand, loop a strap around your back foot and hold onto the strap as you work on the flexibility needed to bind. This is one of Stants’s top recommendations to assist students struggling with flexibility.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- With a yoga strap wrapped around your right (back) foot, slowly bend your right knee, bringing your right heel toward your back gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and grab the strap, meeting your right hand and creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Keep your front leg at a wider angle
Instead of bringing your front shin parallel to the top of the mat, allow it to be at a more comfortable angle to reduce the intensity on your hips.
3. Skip the bind
You can perform a modified version of the pose by keeping your back leg bent and simply holding onto your foot with one hand, without binding with the elbow.
Mermaid pose variations
1. Mermaid pose with one-handed hold
For beginners or those with limited shoulder mobility, you can hold your back foot with your left hand without binding the foot into the elbow. Stants suggests this as a way to still benefit from the stretch while “gradually opening the shoulder.”
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Mermaid pose with both hands
For those with advanced flexibility, clasp both hands behind your head, creating a deeper shoulder stretch. This variation intensifies the chest opening and challenges balance, making it a great progression for seasoned practitioners.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Reach your left arm overhead and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
3. Mermaid pose with a forward bend
While in mermaid pose, hinge forward from the hips over your front leg, increasing the stretch in your hip and adding a balance challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Lean your torso forward as far as you can.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
4. Mermaid pose with a straight binding arm
Kick your back leg straight while holding the foot, extending your arm for a deep chest and shoulder stretch. This variation opens your chest and intensifies the shoulder stretch, perfect for advanced practitioners seeking a deeper challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Extend your right leg back as far as you can while still keeping your chest open and hips squared toward the front of the mat.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
Common mistakes to avoid in mermaid pose—and how to fix them
1. Your hips aren’t aligned
Ensure your hips are squared toward the front of the mat. If they’re tilting to one side, use a yoga block under the hip of your front leg to level them. Stants reminds students that “the bind is so tempting,” but warns against sacrificing alignment for the sake of getting into the bind too quickly.
2. You force the bind
Don’t rush into the bind. If your shoulder or hip flexibility isn’t there yet, focus on the preparatory steps and use props to support your progress.
3. You over-arch your lower back
Engage your core to avoid collapsing into your lower back. Think about lengthening your spine rather than simply bending backward.
Who mermaid pose is best for (and who should avoid it)
Mermaid pose is best for:
- Experienced yogis with a solid foundation in hip-opening and back-bending postures.
- Those looking to increase flexibility in their hips, shoulders, and spine.
Avoid mermaid pose if:
- You have knee, hip, or lower back injuries, as the pose can place pressure on these areas. Stants cautions that “someone with a low back, hip, or knee injury might want to avoid practicing mermaid,” due to the deep stretch and binding required.
- You’re pregnant or have shoulder instability, as the binding aspect can be challenging and potentially unsafe.
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Mermaid pose (Eka Pada Rajakapotasana in Sanskrit) is a graceful and challenging yoga posture that beautifully combines flexibility, strength, and balance. It’s a deep hip opener that also targets your spine, chest, and shoulders, making it an all-encompassing pose for building strength and flexibility.
But starting from the ground up is key in mermaid pose, according to Heather Stants, a yoga and movement teacher and the creator of Dance Flow Yoga. Like any advanced yoga pose, it requires a thoughtful approach and proper preparation.
Ahead, we share exactly how to do mermaid pose, its benefits, ways to modify it or kick it up a notch, and more.
How to do mermaid pose the right way every time
Before diving into mermaid pose, it’s essential to warm up properly and approach the pose with mindfulness. Stants advises.
Time should be spent on lengthening the hip flexors and practicing back-bending postures, like camel pose (Ustrasana), before attempting the full bind in mermaid (where you link your hands together at the top of the move). Always listen to your body and respect your limits, she says.
- Start in downward-facing dog (Adho Mukha Svanasana). Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose (Kapotasana). Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and clasp your hands together, creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
The benefits of mermaid pose
1. It opens up your hips and shoulders
Mermaid pose offers a deep stretch for your hip flexors, quadriceps, and shoulders, enhancing overall flexibility. Stants highlights that the pose helps with lengthening your hip flexors and making other back-bending postures more accessible, which is helpful preparation for more advanced postures.
2. It strengthens your core and back
The pose requires significant core engagement, helping to build stability and strength in your torso. A strong core translates to better posture, reduced risk of injury, and an easier time lifting and carrying heavy objects (think: groceries, moving boxes, etc.) in your everyday life.
3. It improves balance
Holding the pose demands focus and balance, which can improve coordination and stability in other yoga poses. Not to mention, it can make daily tasks like leaning over to tie your shoes, walking up and down stairs, and reaching up to grab something on the top shelf easier.
Tips to modify mermaid pose
1. Use a strap
If you can’t reach your foot with your hand, loop a strap around your back foot and hold onto the strap as you work on the flexibility needed to bind. This is one of Stants’s top recommendations to assist students struggling with flexibility.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- With a yoga strap wrapped around your right (back) foot, slowly bend your right knee, bringing your right heel toward your back gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and grab the strap, meeting your right hand and creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Keep your front leg at a wider angle
Instead of bringing your front shin parallel to the top of the mat, allow it to be at a more comfortable angle to reduce the intensity on your hips.
3. Skip the bind
You can perform a modified version of the pose by keeping your back leg bent and simply holding onto your foot with one hand, without binding with the elbow.
Mermaid pose variations
1. Mermaid pose with one-handed hold
For beginners or those with limited shoulder mobility, you can hold your back foot with your left hand without binding the foot into the elbow. Stants suggests this as a way to still benefit from the stretch while “gradually opening the shoulder.”
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Mermaid pose with both hands
For those with advanced flexibility, clasp both hands behind your head, creating a deeper shoulder stretch. This variation intensifies the chest opening and challenges balance, making it a great progression for seasoned practitioners.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Reach your left arm overhead and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
3. Mermaid pose with a forward bend
While in mermaid pose, hinge forward from the hips over your front leg, increasing the stretch in your hip and adding a balance challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Lean your torso forward as far as you can.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
4. Mermaid pose with a straight binding arm
Kick your back leg straight while holding the foot, extending your arm for a deep chest and shoulder stretch. This variation opens your chest and intensifies the shoulder stretch, perfect for advanced practitioners seeking a deeper challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Extend your right leg back as far as you can while still keeping your chest open and hips squared toward the front of the mat.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
Common mistakes to avoid in mermaid pose—and how to fix them
1. Your hips aren’t aligned
Ensure your hips are squared toward the front of the mat. If they’re tilting to one side, use a yoga block under the hip of your front leg to level them. Stants reminds students that “the bind is so tempting,” but warns against sacrificing alignment for the sake of getting into the bind too quickly.
2. You force the bind
Don’t rush into the bind. If your shoulder or hip flexibility isn’t there yet, focus on the preparatory steps and use props to support your progress.
3. You over-arch your lower back
Engage your core to avoid collapsing into your lower back. Think about lengthening your spine rather than simply bending backward.
Who mermaid pose is best for (and who should avoid it)
Mermaid pose is best for:
- Experienced yogis with a solid foundation in hip-opening and back-bending postures.
- Those looking to increase flexibility in their hips, shoulders, and spine.
Avoid mermaid pose if:
- You have knee, hip, or lower back injuries, as the pose can place pressure on these areas. Stants cautions that “someone with a low back, hip, or knee injury might want to avoid practicing mermaid,” due to the deep stretch and binding required.
- You’re pregnant or have shoulder instability, as the binding aspect can be challenging and potentially unsafe.
Channel Your Inner Ariel With Mermaid Pose—Here’s How to Add It to Your Yoga Practice
It’ll help you boost your strength, flexibility, and balance.
Mermaid pose (Eka Pada Rajakapotasana in Sanskrit) is a graceful and challenging yoga posture that beautifully combines flexibility, strength, and balance. It’s a deep hip opener that also targets your spine, chest, and shoulders, making it an all-encompassing pose for building strength and flexibility.
But starting from the ground up is key in mermaid pose, according to Heather Stants, a yoga and movement teacher and the creator of Dance Flow Yoga. Like any advanced yoga pose, it requires a thoughtful approach and proper preparation.
Ahead, we share exactly how to do mermaid pose, its benefits, ways to modify it or kick it up a notch, and more.
How to do mermaid pose the right way every time
Before diving into mermaid pose, it’s essential to warm up properly and approach the pose with mindfulness. Stants advises.
Time should be spent on lengthening the hip flexors and practicing back-bending postures, like camel pose (Ustrasana), before attempting the full bind in mermaid (where you link your hands together at the top of the move). Always listen to your body and respect your limits, she says.
- Start in downward-facing dog (Adho Mukha Svanasana). Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose (Kapotasana). Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and clasp your hands together, creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
The benefits of mermaid pose
1. It opens up your hips and shoulders
Mermaid pose offers a deep stretch for your hip flexors, quadriceps, and shoulders, enhancing overall flexibility. Stants highlights that the pose helps with lengthening your hip flexors and making other back-bending postures more accessible, which is helpful preparation for more advanced postures.
2. It strengthens your core and back
The pose requires significant core engagement, helping to build stability and strength in your torso. A strong core translates to better posture, reduced risk of injury, and an easier time lifting and carrying heavy objects (think: groceries, moving boxes, etc.) in your everyday life.
3. It improves balance
Holding the pose demands focus and balance, which can improve coordination and stability in other yoga poses. Not to mention, it can make daily tasks like leaning over to tie your shoes, walking up and down stairs, and reaching up to grab something on the top shelf easier.
Tips to modify mermaid pose
1. Use a strap
If you can’t reach your foot with your hand, loop a strap around your back foot and hold onto the strap as you work on the flexibility needed to bind. This is one of Stants’s top recommendations to assist students struggling with flexibility.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- With a yoga strap wrapped around your right (back) foot, slowly bend your right knee, bringing your right heel toward your back gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and grab the strap, meeting your right hand and creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Keep your front leg at a wider angle
Instead of bringing your front shin parallel to the top of the mat, allow it to be at a more comfortable angle to reduce the intensity on your hips.
3. Skip the bind
You can perform a modified version of the pose by keeping your back leg bent and simply holding onto your foot with one hand, without binding with the elbow.
Mermaid pose variations
1. Mermaid pose with one-handed hold
For beginners or those with limited shoulder mobility, you can hold your back foot with your left hand without binding the foot into the elbow. Stants suggests this as a way to still benefit from the stretch while “gradually opening the shoulder.”
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Mermaid pose with both hands
For those with advanced flexibility, clasp both hands behind your head, creating a deeper shoulder stretch. This variation intensifies the chest opening and challenges balance, making it a great progression for seasoned practitioners.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Reach your left arm overhead and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
3. Mermaid pose with a forward bend
While in mermaid pose, hinge forward from the hips over your front leg, increasing the stretch in your hip and adding a balance challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Lean your torso forward as far as you can.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
4. Mermaid pose with a straight binding arm
Kick your back leg straight while holding the foot, extending your arm for a deep chest and shoulder stretch. This variation opens your chest and intensifies the shoulder stretch, perfect for advanced practitioners seeking a deeper challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Extend your right leg back as far as you can while still keeping your chest open and hips squared toward the front of the mat.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
Common mistakes to avoid in mermaid pose—and how to fix them
1. Your hips aren’t aligned
Ensure your hips are squared toward the front of the mat. If they’re tilting to one side, use a yoga block under the hip of your front leg to level them. Stants reminds students that “the bind is so tempting,” but warns against sacrificing alignment for the sake of getting into the bind too quickly.
2. You force the bind
Don’t rush into the bind. If your shoulder or hip flexibility isn’t there yet, focus on the preparatory steps and use props to support your progress.
3. You over-arch your lower back
Engage your core to avoid collapsing into your lower back. Think about lengthening your spine rather than simply bending backward.
Who mermaid pose is best for (and who should avoid it)
Mermaid pose is best for:
- Experienced yogis with a solid foundation in hip-opening and back-bending postures.
- Those looking to increase flexibility in their hips, shoulders, and spine.
Avoid mermaid pose if:
- You have knee, hip, or lower back injuries, as the pose can place pressure on these areas. Stants cautions that “someone with a low back, hip, or knee injury might want to avoid practicing mermaid,” due to the deep stretch and binding required.
- You’re pregnant or have shoulder instability, as the binding aspect can be challenging and potentially unsafe.
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Gut health can be complicated, so let’s break it down.
Mermaid pose (Eka Pada Rajakapotasana in Sanskrit) is a graceful and challenging yoga posture that beautifully combines flexibility, strength, and balance. It’s a deep hip opener that also targets your spine, chest, and shoulders, making it an all-encompassing pose for building strength and flexibility.
But starting from the ground up is key in mermaid pose, according to Heather Stants, a yoga and movement teacher and the creator of Dance Flow Yoga. Like any advanced yoga pose, it requires a thoughtful approach and proper preparation.
Ahead, we share exactly how to do mermaid pose, its benefits, ways to modify it or kick it up a notch, and more.
How to do mermaid pose the right way every time
Before diving into mermaid pose, it’s essential to warm up properly and approach the pose with mindfulness. Stants advises.
Time should be spent on lengthening the hip flexors and practicing back-bending postures, like camel pose (Ustrasana), before attempting the full bind in mermaid (where you link your hands together at the top of the move). Always listen to your body and respect your limits, she says.
- Start in downward-facing dog (Adho Mukha Svanasana). Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose (Kapotasana). Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and clasp your hands together, creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
The benefits of mermaid pose
1. It opens up your hips and shoulders
Mermaid pose offers a deep stretch for your hip flexors, quadriceps, and shoulders, enhancing overall flexibility. Stants highlights that the pose helps with lengthening your hip flexors and making other back-bending postures more accessible, which is helpful preparation for more advanced postures.
2. It strengthens your core and back
The pose requires significant core engagement, helping to build stability and strength in your torso. A strong core translates to better posture, reduced risk of injury, and an easier time lifting and carrying heavy objects (think: groceries, moving boxes, etc.) in your everyday life.
3. It improves balance
Holding the pose demands focus and balance, which can improve coordination and stability in other yoga poses. Not to mention, it can make daily tasks like leaning over to tie your shoes, walking up and down stairs, and reaching up to grab something on the top shelf easier.
Tips to modify mermaid pose
1. Use a strap
If you can’t reach your foot with your hand, loop a strap around your back foot and hold onto the strap as you work on the flexibility needed to bind. This is one of Stants’s top recommendations to assist students struggling with flexibility.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- With a yoga strap wrapped around your right (back) foot, slowly bend your right knee, bringing your right heel toward your back gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Slide your right foot into the crook of your right elbow. If possible, reach your left arm overhead and grab the strap, meeting your right hand and creating a “mermaid tail” with your arms.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Keep your front leg at a wider angle
Instead of bringing your front shin parallel to the top of the mat, allow it to be at a more comfortable angle to reduce the intensity on your hips.
3. Skip the bind
You can perform a modified version of the pose by keeping your back leg bent and simply holding onto your foot with one hand, without binding with the elbow.
Mermaid pose variations
1. Mermaid pose with one-handed hold
For beginners or those with limited shoulder mobility, you can hold your back foot with your left hand without binding the foot into the elbow. Stants suggests this as a way to still benefit from the stretch while “gradually opening the shoulder.”
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
2. Mermaid pose with both hands
For those with advanced flexibility, clasp both hands behind your head, creating a deeper shoulder stretch. This variation intensifies the chest opening and challenges balance, making it a great progression for seasoned practitioners.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Reach your left arm overhead and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
3. Mermaid pose with a forward bend
While in mermaid pose, hinge forward from the hips over your front leg, increasing the stretch in your hip and adding a balance challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Lean your torso forward as far as you can.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
4. Mermaid pose with a straight binding arm
Kick your back leg straight while holding the foot, extending your arm for a deep chest and shoulder stretch. This variation opens your chest and intensifies the shoulder stretch, perfect for advanced practitioners seeking a deeper challenge.
- Start in downward-facing dog. Bring your right knee forward, placing it behind your right wrist while sliding your left leg back for pigeon pose. Square your hips toward the front of the mat.
- Press into your fingertips as you lift your chest, engaging your core and lengthening your spine before you settle back into your hips. Before moving on to the next step, ensure that your lower back feels comfortable here and your hips are not straining. If so, consider putting a block under the hip of your bent leg.
- Slowly bend your right (back) knee, bringing your right heel toward your right gluteus muscle.
- With your right hand, reach back and grab the inside of your right foot or ankle. Keep your chest open and your gaze forward.
- Extend your right leg back as far as you can while still keeping your chest open and hips squared toward the front of the mat.
- Once you’re in the full expression of the pose, this requires quite a bit of balance. Engage your core, but don’t forget to continue to breathe—if you start breathing shallow or rapid breaths, this may be a sign you’re not comfortable here.
- Stay in the pose for five to 10 breaths, maintaining an open chest and square hips.
- To exit the pose, release your foot and place your hands on the ground on either side of your front leg. Press yourself up into a one-legged downward-facing dog, and then back into a full downward-facing dog.
- Repeat on the other side.
Common mistakes to avoid in mermaid pose—and how to fix them
1. Your hips aren’t aligned
Ensure your hips are squared toward the front of the mat. If they’re tilting to one side, use a yoga block under the hip of your front leg to level them. Stants reminds students that “the bind is so tempting,” but warns against sacrificing alignment for the sake of getting into the bind too quickly.
2. You force the bind
Don’t rush into the bind. If your shoulder or hip flexibility isn’t there yet, focus on the preparatory steps and use props to support your progress.
3. You over-arch your lower back
Engage your core to avoid collapsing into your lower back. Think about lengthening your spine rather than simply bending backward.
Who mermaid pose is best for (and who should avoid it)
Mermaid pose is best for:
- Experienced yogis with a solid foundation in hip-opening and back-bending postures.
- Those looking to increase flexibility in their hips, shoulders, and spine.
Avoid mermaid pose if:
- You have knee, hip, or lower back injuries, as the pose can place pressure on these areas. Stants cautions that “someone with a low back, hip, or knee injury might want to avoid practicing mermaid,” due to the deep stretch and binding required.
- You’re pregnant or have shoulder instability, as the binding aspect can be challenging and potentially unsafe.
User Research Is Storytelling
Ever since I was a boy, I’ve been fascinated with movies. I loved the characters and the excitement—but most of all the stories. I wanted to be an actor. And I believed that I’d get to do the things that Indiana Jones did and go on exciting adventures. I even dreamed up ideas for movies that my friends and I could make and star in. But they never went any further. I did, however, end up working in user experience (UX). Now, I realize that there’s an element of theater to UX—I hadn’t really considered it before, but user research is storytelling. And to get the most out of user research, you need to tell a good story where you bring stakeholders—the product team and decision makers—along and get them interested in learning more.
Think of your favorite movie. More than likely it follows a three-act structure that’s commonly seen in storytelling: the setup, the conflict, and the resolution. The first act shows what exists today, and it helps you get to know the characters and the challenges and problems that they face. Act two introduces the conflict, where the action is. Here, problems grow or get worse. And the third and final act is the resolution. This is where the issues are resolved and the characters learn and change. I believe that this structure is also a great way to think about user research, and I think that it can be especially helpful in explaining user research to others.
Use storytelling as a structure to do research
It’s sad to say, but many have come to see research as being expendable. If budgets or timelines are tight, research tends to be one of the first things to go. Instead of investing in research, some product managers rely on designers or—worse—their own opinion to make the “right” choices for users based on their experience or accepted best practices. That may get teams some of the way, but that approach can so easily miss out on solving users’ real problems. To remain user-centered, this is something we should avoid. User research elevates design. It keeps it on track, pointing to problems and opportunities. Being aware of the issues with your product and reacting to them can help you stay ahead of your competitors.
In the three-act structure, each act corresponds to a part of the process, and each part is critical to telling the whole story. Let’s look at the different acts and how they align with user research.
Act one: setup
The setup is all about understanding the background, and that’s where foundational research comes in. Foundational research (also called generative, discovery, or initial research) helps you understand users and identify their problems. You’re learning about what exists today, the challenges users have, and how the challenges affect them—just like in the movies. To do foundational research, you can conduct contextual inquiries or diary studies (or both!), which can help you start to identify problems as well as opportunities. It doesn’t need to be a huge investment in time or money.
Erika Hall writes about minimum viable ethnography, which can be as simple as spending 15 minutes with a user and asking them one thing: “‘Walk me through your day yesterday.’ That’s it. Present that one request. Shut up and listen to them for 15 minutes. Do your damndest to keep yourself and your interests out of it. Bam, you’re doing ethnography.” According to Hall, “[This] will probably prove quite illuminating. In the highly unlikely case that you didn’t learn anything new or useful, carry on with enhanced confidence in your direction.”
This makes total sense to me. And I love that this makes user research so accessible. You don’t need to prepare a lot of documentation; you can just recruit participants and do it! This can yield a wealth of information about your users, and it’ll help you better understand them and what’s going on in their lives. That’s really what act one is all about: understanding where users are coming from.
Jared Spool talks about the importance of foundational research and how it should form the bulk of your research. If you can draw from any additional user data that you can get your hands on, such as surveys or analytics, that can supplement what you’ve heard in the foundational studies or even point to areas that need further investigation. Together, all this data paints a clearer picture of the state of things and all its shortcomings. And that’s the beginning of a compelling story. It’s the point in the plot where you realize that the main characters—or the users in this case—are facing challenges that they need to overcome. Like in the movies, this is where you start to build empathy for the characters and root for them to succeed. And hopefully stakeholders are now doing the same. Their sympathy may be with their business, which could be losing money because users can’t complete certain tasks. Or maybe they do empathize with users’ struggles. Either way, act one is your initial hook to get the stakeholders interested and invested.
Once stakeholders begin to understand the value of foundational research, that can open doors to more opportunities that involve users in the decision-making process. And that can guide product teams toward being more user-centered. This benefits everyone—users, the product, and stakeholders. It’s like winning an Oscar in movie terms—it often leads to your product being well received and successful. And this can be an incentive for stakeholders to repeat this process with other products. Storytelling is the key to this process, and knowing how to tell a good story is the only way to get stakeholders to really care about doing more research.
This brings us to act two, where you iteratively evaluate a design or concept to see whether it addresses the issues.
Act two: conflict
Act two is all about digging deeper into the problems that you identified in act one. This usually involves directional research, such as usability tests, where you assess a potential solution (such as a design) to see whether it addresses the issues that you found. The issues could include unmet needs or problems with a flow or process that’s tripping users up. Like act two in a movie, more issues will crop up along the way. It’s here that you learn more about the characters as they grow and develop through this act.
Usability tests should typically include around five participants according to Jakob Nielsen, who found that that number of users can usually identify most of the problems: “As you add more and more users, you learn less and less because you will keep seeing the same things again and again… After the fifth user, you are wasting your time by observing the same findings repeatedly but not learning much new.”
There are parallels with storytelling here too; if you try to tell a story with too many characters, the plot may get lost. Having fewer participants means that each user’s struggles will be more memorable and easier to relay to other stakeholders when talking about the research. This can help convey the issues that need to be addressed while also highlighting the value of doing the research in the first place.
Researchers have run usability tests in person for decades, but you can also conduct usability tests remotely using tools like Microsoft Teams, Zoom, or other teleconferencing software. This approach has become increasingly popular since the beginning of the pandemic, and it works well. You can think of in-person usability tests like going to a play and remote sessions as more like watching a movie. There are advantages and disadvantages to each. In-person usability research is a much richer experience. Stakeholders can experience the sessions with other stakeholders. You also get real-time reactions—including surprise, agreement, disagreement, and discussions about what they’re seeing. Much like going to a play, where audiences get to take in the stage, the costumes, the lighting, and the actors’ interactions, in-person research lets you see users up close, including their body language, how they interact with the moderator, and how the scene is set up.
If in-person usability testing is like watching a play—staged and controlled—then conducting usability testing in the field is like immersive theater where any two sessions might be very different from one another. You can take usability testing into the field by creating a replica of the space where users interact with the product and then conduct your research there. Or you can go out to meet users at their location to do your research. With either option, you get to see how things work in context, things come up that wouldn’t have in a lab environment—and conversion can shift in entirely different directions. As researchers, you have less control over how these sessions go, but this can sometimes help you understand users even better. Meeting users where they are can provide clues to the external forces that could be affecting how they use your product. In-person usability tests provide another level of detail that’s often missing from remote usability tests.
That’s not to say that the “movies”—remote sessions—aren’t a good option. Remote sessions can reach a wider audience. They allow a lot more stakeholders to be involved in the research and to see what’s going on. And they open the doors to a much wider geographical pool of users. But with any remote session there is the potential of time wasted if participants can’t log in or get their microphone working.
The benefit of usability testing, whether remote or in person, is that you get to see real users interact with the designs in real time, and you can ask them questions to understand their thought processes and grasp of the solution. This can help you not only identify problems but also glean why they’re problems in the first place. Furthermore, you can test hypotheses and gauge whether your thinking is correct. By the end of the sessions, you’ll have a much clearer picture of how usable the designs are and whether they work for their intended purposes. Act two is the heart of the story—where the excitement is—but there can be surprises too. This is equally true of usability tests. Often, participants will say unexpected things, which change the way that you look at things—and these twists in the story can move things in new directions.
Unfortunately, user research is sometimes seen as expendable. And too often usability testing is the only research process that some stakeholders think that they ever need. In fact, if the designs that you’re evaluating in the usability test aren’t grounded in a solid understanding of your users (foundational research), there’s not much to be gained by doing usability testing in the first place. That’s because you’re narrowing the focus of what you’re getting feedback on, without understanding the users’ needs. As a result, there’s no way of knowing whether the designs might solve a problem that users have. It’s only feedback on a particular design in the context of a usability test.
On the other hand, if you only do foundational research, while you might have set out to solve the right problem, you won’t know whether the thing that you’re building will actually solve that. This illustrates the importance of doing both foundational and directional research.
In act two, stakeholders will—hopefully—get to watch the story unfold in the user sessions, which creates the conflict and tension in the current design by surfacing their highs and lows. And in turn, this can help motivate stakeholders to address the issues that come up.
Act three: resolution
While the first two acts are about understanding the background and the tensions that can propel stakeholders into action, the third part is about resolving the problems from the first two acts. While it’s important to have an audience for the first two acts, it’s crucial that they stick around for the final act. That means the whole product team, including developers, UX practitioners, business analysts, delivery managers, product managers, and any other stakeholders that have a say in the next steps. It allows the whole team to hear users’ feedback together, ask questions, and discuss what’s possible within the project’s constraints. And it lets the UX research and design teams clarify, suggest alternatives, or give more context behind their decisions. So you can get everyone on the same page and get agreement on the way forward.
This act is mostly told in voiceover with some audience participation. The researcher is the narrator, who paints a picture of the issues and what the future of the product could look like given the things that the team has learned. They give the stakeholders their recommendations and their guidance on creating this vision.
Nancy Duarte in the Harvard Business Review offers an approach to structuring presentations that follow a persuasive story. “The most effective presenters use the same techniques as great storytellers: By reminding people of the status quo and then revealing the path to a better way, they set up a conflict that needs to be resolved,” writes Duarte. “That tension helps them persuade the audience to adopt a new mindset or behave differently.”
This type of structure aligns well with research results, and particularly results from usability tests. It provides evidence for “what is”—the problems that you’ve identified. And “what could be”—your recommendations on how to address them. And so on and so forth.
You can reinforce your recommendations with examples of things that competitors are doing that could address these issues or with examples where competitors are gaining an edge. Or they can be visual, like quick mockups of how a new design could look that solves a problem. These can help generate conversation and momentum. And this continues until the end of the session when you’ve wrapped everything up in the conclusion by summarizing the main issues and suggesting a way forward. This is the part where you reiterate the main themes or problems and what they mean for the product—the denouement of the story. This stage gives stakeholders the next steps and hopefully the momentum to take those steps!
While we are nearly at the end of this story, let’s reflect on the idea that user research is storytelling. All the elements of a good story are there in the three-act structure of user research:
- Act one: You meet the protagonists (the users) and the antagonists (the problems affecting users). This is the beginning of the plot. In act one, researchers might use methods including contextual inquiry, ethnography, diary studies, surveys, and analytics. The output of these methods can include personas, empathy maps, user journeys, and analytics dashboards.
- Act two: Next, there’s character development. There’s conflict and tension as the protagonists encounter problems and challenges, which they must overcome. In act two, researchers might use methods including usability testing, competitive benchmarking, and heuristics evaluation. The output of these can include usability findings reports, UX strategy documents, usability guidelines, and best practices.
- Act three: The protagonists triumph and you see what a better future looks like. In act three, researchers may use methods including presentation decks, storytelling, and digital media. The output of these can be: presentation decks, video clips, audio clips, and pictures.
The researcher has multiple roles: they’re the storyteller, the director, and the producer. The participants have a small role, but they are significant characters (in the research). And the stakeholders are the audience. But the most important thing is to get the story right and to use storytelling to tell users’ stories through research. By the end, the stakeholders should walk away with a purpose and an eagerness to resolve the product’s ills.
So the next time that you’re planning research with clients or you’re speaking to stakeholders about research that you’ve done, think about how you can weave in some storytelling. Ultimately, user research is a win-win for everyone, and you just need to get stakeholders interested in how the story ends.
I’m an RD, and This Coveted French Baking Dish Has Been the Cornerstone of My Fall Cooking Routine for Years
Perfect for cozy szn.
These days, it’s hard to find a pair of quality athletic sneakers on a budget. Be it a pair of walking shoes for casual strolls around the block or sportier sneakers made for long days in the gym, footwear is so dang expensive. The sportier they are, the more pricey they seem to get; most premium athletic shoes cost between $120 and $180, with some models veering into the low $200 range.
So when I learned about of the Nortvi8 ActiveFloat Sneaker ($50) which costs just $50 and has all of the same features of pricier models—max cushioning, all-day support, a breathable upper—I knew I had to try it. As a frequent footwear tester and gear writer, I was understandably skeptical: Could a shoe at this price point compare with the best sneakers from top brands like Hoka, Brooks, and New Balance? Luckily, I was pleasantly surprised by my experience.
First impressions
This shoe is from outdoor brand Nortiv8 but it looks like the design was taken straight from the Hoka Bondi (the wavy midsole, the extended heel, the gradient of colors) with a slightly more approachable feel. When I opened the box, I was surprised at the shoes’ quality; the cushioning was squishy and plush, the white color was bright and crisp, and the upper was nicely padded without appearing too thick. From looks alone, these sneaks were promising.
Performance
I put them to the test on my daily walks in Brooklyn where I racked up thousands of steps and even tried them during a 4-mile run. During my walks, they felt surprisingly comfortable and supportive. I found myself reaching for them regularly in my already-stacked rotation of shoes, especially when my feet were achy or tired. Another major reason? The white color stays clean longer than other sneakers because it has plastic TPU overlays that don’t collect dirt the same way that mesh does.
Then, the comfort: These shoes have an EVA foam midsole which strikes the perfect balance between soft and springy, so it feels good both while you’re walking and standing around. Under the heel, you’ll find a few inches of foam, which is important because this is the first place most people put weight when they’re walking. This took some stress off my joints, and the rocker design (lifted at the toe) helped me to roll through my stride.
While I loved these shoes for walking, they wouldn’t be my first pick for running, although I would use them for shorter jogs. About two miles into my run, my left knee started to hurt. My best guess is because these aren’t very secure; the only stability feature is the TPU film on the upper, which adds a bit of structure but doesn’t do as much as internal rails to keep your foot in line. With all that foam underneath, my foot shifted a bit too much as I ran over the broken sidewalks in Bushwick, leaving the rest of my legs to pick up the slack to keep me upright. The ankle hole also felt loose, so I quickly realized I had to lace them up tightly if I wanted to feel secure.
What I did love was the roomy toe box. I have wide feet, and I found the shape to be plenty generous without feeling like I’m swimming in them. After my four miles in 80-degree weather, my toes didn’t feel sore or swollen, which is common for me. However, some reviewers note that they run big, (although I have wide feet and I found them true to size). If you have narrow feet, you may want to size down half a size.
Final thoughts
For $50, this shoe is a steal. If you can afford the Hoka Bondi, it offers more support and has a much more durable foam that will last many more miles. But if you are looking to save some money and get a shoe that is comfortable enough for long days of standing and walking, the Nortiv8 ActiveFloat has got your back (er, feet?) on a budget.
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These days, it’s hard to find a pair of quality athletic sneakers on a budget. Be it a pair of walking shoes for casual strolls around the block or sportier sneakers made for long days in the gym, footwear is so dang expensive. The sportier they are, the more pricey they seem to get; most premium athletic shoes cost between $120 and $180, with some models veering into the low $200 range.
So when I learned about of the Nortvi8 ActiveFloat Sneaker ($50) which costs just $50 and has all of the same features of pricier models—max cushioning, all-day support, a breathable upper—I knew I had to try it. As a frequent footwear tester and gear writer, I was understandably skeptical: Could a shoe at this price point compare with the best sneakers from top brands like Hoka, Brooks, and New Balance? Luckily, I was pleasantly surprised by my experience.
First impressions
This shoe is from outdoor brand Nortiv8 but it looks like the design was taken straight from the Hoka Bondi (the wavy midsole, the extended heel, the gradient of colors) with a slightly more approachable feel. When I opened the box, I was surprised at the shoes’ quality; the cushioning was squishy and plush, the white color was bright and crisp, and the upper was nicely padded without appearing too thick. From looks alone, these sneaks were promising.
Performance
I put them to the test on my daily walks in Brooklyn where I racked up thousands of steps and even tried them during a 4-mile run. During my walks, they felt surprisingly comfortable and supportive. I found myself reaching for them regularly in my already-stacked rotation of shoes, especially when my feet were achy or tired. Another major reason? The white color stays clean longer than other sneakers because it has plastic TPU overlays that don’t collect dirt the same way that mesh does.
Then, the comfort: These shoes have an EVA foam midsole which strikes the perfect balance between soft and springy, so it feels good both while you’re walking and standing around. Under the heel, you’ll find a few inches of foam, which is important because this is the first place most people put weight when they’re walking. This took some stress off my joints, and the rocker design (lifted at the toe) helped me to roll through my stride.
While I loved these shoes for walking, they wouldn’t be my first pick for running, although I would use them for shorter jogs. About two miles into my run, my left knee started to hurt. My best guess is because these aren’t very secure; the only stability feature is the TPU film on the upper, which adds a bit of structure but doesn’t do as much as internal rails to keep your foot in line. With all that foam underneath, my foot shifted a bit too much as I ran over the broken sidewalks in Bushwick, leaving the rest of my legs to pick up the slack to keep me upright. The ankle hole also felt loose, so I quickly realized I had to lace them up tightly if I wanted to feel secure.
What I did love was the roomy toe box. I have wide feet, and I found the shape to be plenty generous without feeling like I’m swimming in them. After my four miles in 80-degree weather, my toes didn’t feel sore or swollen, which is common for me. However, some reviewers note that they run big, (although I have wide feet and I found them true to size). If you have narrow feet, you may want to size down half a size.
Final thoughts
For $50, this shoe is a steal. If you can afford the Hoka Bondi, it offers more support and has a much more durable foam that will last many more miles. But if you are looking to save some money and get a shoe that is comfortable enough for long days of standing and walking, the Nortiv8 ActiveFloat has got your back (er, feet?) on a budget.