heuristic [hyoo-ris-tik or, often, yoo-] adjective
- serving to indicate or point out; stimulating interest as a means of furthering investigation.
- encouraging a person to learn, discover, understand, or solve problems on his or her own, as by experimenting, evaluating possible answers or solutions, or by trial and error: a heuristic teaching method.
- of, pertaining to, or based on experimentation, evaluation, or trial-and-error methods.
The 5 Components of Usability?
The definition of heuristic refers to techniques, activities or lessons that allow someone to discover something for himself or by finding solutions through experiments or loosely defined rules.
In short - the "heuristics" of your site is the level of "solvability" or "learnability" of your website.
In a heuristic evaluation, the user interface is reviewed by experts and its compliance to usability heuristics (general characteristics of good user experience, based on prior experience) is assessed, and any violating aspects are recorded.
The five main components of usability quality used in a heuristic evaluation are:
- Learnability: How easy is it for users to accomplish basic tasks the first time they encounter the design? Do they have to throw away decades of web UX standards, or can they jump right in?
- Efficiency: Once users have learned the design, how quickly can they perform tasks? There is a fine balance between building small wins for users, and making them jump through hoops to get what they want.
- Memorability: When users return to the design after a period of not using it, how easily can they reestablish proficiency? Hint: you should be striving for recognition, not recollection.
- Errors: How many errors do users make, how severe are these errors, and how easily can they recover from the errors? Do you have an undo button or an ejection seat?
- Satisfaction: How pleasant is it to use the design? I can take a boat to visit Hawaii, but it is likely an airplane would be more pleasant.
Pros – Where Heuristics Help
A heuristic is a mental shortcut that allows people to solve problems and make judgments quickly and efficiently. These rule-of-thumb strategies shorten decision-making time and allow people to function without constantly stopping to think about the next course of action.
If a window displays a user does not want to see, they would look for an "X" or some other button in the header of the window. There is no need for text to describe the functionality - an intuitive design element is placed heuristically.
Cons – Where Heuristics Damage
Heuristics are harmful when we make the damning mistake of assuming users will know what to do on your site. The biggest mistakes include:
- Not explaining icons
- Confusing icons
- Atypical navigation
- Buzzword laden copy that assumes
- Design elements which defy standards
- Putting design above usability
We get into trouble when we make ourselves the definitive authority on usability rather than our users.
So when we're doing a heuristic analysis of your site, let's make sure to have actual users in mind, not what we think users will like. Heck - invite some users in and see how your site measures up in the real world.
What are your thoughts on heuristics? Leave your comments below. For bonus reading, check out our post on the types of heuristics.