"Priming utility" and "information perception"

The core of product design is: users, so understanding what users think and meeting user needs has become the life pursuit of PMs! . However, PMs cannot read minds and will always encounter various difficulties in understanding user needs. At this time, a little simple psychological knowledge can help you in times of need.

Psychology is mostly an inductive explanation of daily behavior. After reading this, many people will think that I already knew this, but with this kind of hindsight, we will all say that before something happened, or the answer to the mystery Who knew the foresight before the revelation? Most of the time, we will be in a state of uncertainty: even if we accept the theory of taking a step back, the sky will be brighter, but we will not deny that when we meet on a narrow road, the brave will win.

Therefore, one of the great charms of psychology may lie in:

As shown in the example in the picture, maybe the customer did not initially want to complain about the service, but because of the slogan on the window next to it, Guidance amplifies some potential or subtle dissatisfaction, ultimately increasing the number of complaints about service. This initiates an application of the effect in daily life.

Psychologists have found that even some subtle invisible language signs, color flashes, smell stimulation, etc. can have an invisible impact on our thinking, actions and even attitudes. Therefore, when designing products, we can also draw on this unconscious priming effect to guide users' psychological and behavioral responses.

In order to stimulate users' appetite, many restaurants use brightly colored tableware; while many experience stores use warm-colored lighting to increase user experience; this is the use of color to activate customers. At the same time, some software UI designers are also working hard on the color configuration of the product's UI interface. Products that focus on knowledge sharing, such as Zhihu, Guoke, Douban, etc., choose cold colors such as green and blue as the main UI colors to give users a professional impression; while NetEase News, Toutiao, etc. News apps choose stimulating colors such as red to intensify user stimulation.

To reach 100,000 articles on WeChat, headlines are often indispensable, and this is also an application of priming effect: using language to guide consumers. In addition, there are often some function or permission instructions in the APP. Whether you want users to use/turn off this function sometimes completely depends on the settings of the instructions. For example, when you want users to use it, check it by default and use the perspective assumed to be accepted by the user in the text description for subsequent descriptions.

As the example in the picture shows, even when a fact is placed in front of two people with conflicting views, both parties will be dissatisfied with the same fact. This is similar to how in a football match, both sides of the dispute believe that the referee is unfair.

Psychologists call this phenomenon belief fixation and verification bias. Stubborn beliefs make it easier for people to accept ideas that are similar to their own views, and more likely to reject ideas that are contrary to their own views; while verification bias allows this concept to be further developed, making people actively look for those ideas when receiving information. Information that supports one's beliefs while ignoring information that contradicts one's beliefs is so difficult to achieve.

This belief-based information processing bias is an inherent weakness of human nature, and PMs should be more vigilant about it when communicating with the team.

I think this requirement is completely meaningless and there is no need to waste resources.

In this state of stalemate, you may try to put yourself in someone else's shoes and take the initiative to look for supporting evidence for viewpoints that are contrary to your own.

PM needs to be vigilant when receiving feedback from users: this demand is a demand derived from selective screening of information in the current environment based on the user's beliefs and values. Therefore, to understand user needs and meet user needs, we must have a full understanding of the environmental background and crowd characteristics of the users.

The picture is a famous prescient experimental picture. If the subjects are told in advance that this is a Nazi, they will think that the person's expression is sinister and cold; if the subjects are told that this is a Nazi, they will think that the person's expression is sinister and cold; If you are a philanthropist, they will think that this person's expression is kind and gentle. The same picture can lead to two completely different views just because of the different originally assumed ideas. This is the prescient/stereotype that everyone has in daily life.

We are always deeply impressed by vivid and impactful pictures, words and events, and use these one-sided information to form a comprehensive view of others or things. This leads to many of our views and opinions being actually full of bias.

If you look at it from the user's perspective, foresight will affect the user's subsequent attitude towards the product; and if you look at it from the PM's perspective, foresight will affect the PM's grasp of demand. Therefore, for PM, on the one hand, it is necessary to make the product leave a good first impression on users, and on the other hand, it is also necessary to conduct demand analysis from multiple angles.

To be continued~

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