Attitudinal Research: The Prime UX Research Method for Future Business Success

A cutting-edge product or service backed by a foolproof marketing strategy is the primary requirement for business success. No matter if it is personalization, short video content, sponsored content, or whatnot, all of these marketing and customer acquisition methods of today depend on user and market research.

Attitudinal research is one of the core methods used by businesses to get insight into user preferences and needs.

I have found it utilitarian as it encapsulates several concepts, like focus groups, surveys, etc., that can help your business unlock the true potential of your product.

From qualitative to quantitative methods, attitude research can enhance the UX by identifying opportunities to further innovate the product.

Let’s dive into this blog and unravel the idea of attitudinal research.

What is Attitudinal Research?

Attitudinal research is a systematic way to study and analyze an individual's attitudes, opinions, beliefs, and perceptions towards a specific product. In other words, I would say that how people feel about an idea, product, or service comes under this research.

It aims to understand the underlying motivations, preferences, and behavioral intentions of individuals within a target audience.

The best thing about this research is that it can uncover mind-blowing insights and rewards for a business.

As it is solely about what a user says rather than what they do, it requires a high level of commitment.

I found an interesting quote from an anthropologist, Margaret Mead. As per Margaret Mead, “What people say, what people do, and what people say they do are entirely different things.”

Hence, if your brand has to get to the core of people’s behavior, attitudinal research has to combine with behavioral research for accurate results.

Behavioral Research

Behavioral research is another type of research useful in learning about UX. It is the process of directly observing a person and their actions. Some of the best ways to conduct behavioral research are user analytics, eye tracking, first-click tests, usability testing, tree tests, and A/B tests.

Types of Attitudinal Research

The attitudinal UX research can be conducted in two ways.

Quantitatively

In this kind of research, people’s attitudes and opinions are quantified based on the choices provided to them. Closed-ended questions form the basis of this user research method. Users are provided with questions with options, such as yes/no or multiple choice.

The frequency (quantitative data) at which people have their opinions and attitudes can be clearly interpreted.

Qualitatively

Qualitative research, unlike quantitative, deals with acquiring user opinions in a more comprehensive way. Unlike limited options to choose from, you can gain valuable information from the respondent's detailed answers.

Based on the type of research, here are the best methods of attitudinal research.

Surveys and questionnaires

Surveys and questionnaires are the easiest ways to conduct attitudinal research. You can add open-ended and closed-ended questions to understand the user's preferences, opinions, and needs.

I find these methods helpful and faster as long as you craft clear, closed-ended questions.

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Interviews and focus groups

These are qualitative forms of attitudinal user-experience research. In interviews, one-to-one communication happens between the user and the researcher.

On the other hand, focus groups include one-to-many communication. A group can have 6 to 12 people with the same interests and characteristics. A single researcher can interview to collect data from the group.

Online and social media research

Online platforms and social media channels like Facebook, Instagram, etc., provide opportunities to collect attitudinal data via several means, such as user-generated content, comments, or user interactions.

Researchers can analyze online discussions, sentiment analysis, or social media metrics to gauge public opinion or attitudes toward specific topics, products, services, or brands. I suggest you use AI when analyzing online user data as it can be in heaps.

What are the Benefits of Attitudinal UX Research Methods?

No matter if you have a physical product or a digital product, user-experience research and market research are paramount to improving UX.

Here are some exciting statistics I came across-

• 8 in 10 customers are willing to pay more for a better user experience.
• 48% of consumers expect a response to social media questions and complaints within 24 hours.

Both of these stats convey the need for attitudinal research and, when done right, can lead to the following benefits!

• Comprehend user feelings

With attitudinal research, you can comprehend the way users feel about your product. You can conduct interviews and craft closed-end questions to know everything in detail.

• Identify the market opportunities

Rating scale, checklist, and rank order questions are some of the closed-end question categories that you can include in your survey. As the answers to these questions are pretty concise, they can help you understand the users' opinions regarding your service or product.

Based on that, fresh market opportunities can be recognized and acted on. 

• Seamless market segmentation and targeting

With attitudinal research, you can focus on a specific set of customers for marketing your product. Social media channels like Facebook allow you to specifically segment your users based on certain characteristics like demographics, age, interest, etc.

Based on the research data, you can segment the audience and target a specific set of audiences with a specific service or product.

• Better product development

With an in-depth understanding of user opinions and feelings, businesses can focus on the betterment of the product. Stats suggest that 39% of the users will stop engaging with content when loading time takes too long.

To ensure an enhanced user experience, your UX design changes can be improved to make your final product more interactive, like a website.

• Build brand perception

With attitudinal research methods like interviews, researchers can gain a better understanding of user needs and preferences. Thereby further innovating their products and building better brand perception in the long run.How to Design Attitudinal UX Research Studies?Attitudinal research can help you gain valuable insights from the data. Based on that, businesses can make products that meet the needs and preferences of the users. All of this is only possible when the questions in the surveys, diary studies, questionnaires, etc., are planned and crafted carefully.Here is a step-by-step method to design an attitudinal UX research study.

• Formulating research questions

The first step is to craft proper research questions. Now, these questions have to be crafted based on simple research. Check the brand's social media channels, e-commerce accounts, and other online channels where the brand markets or sells its products.Read the user reviews, suggestions, preferences, and issues posted by the users. After acquiring all this data, form a set of questions that will be used in the research.As you will have prior knowledge of the issues and preferences related to the previous products or product versions, the questions will help you gain better insights.

• Sampling techniques

It is not possible to collect data from every customer. Therefore, sampling techniques are used to select people from a group. Random and non-random selections are made to collect data.Based on the type of sampling technique, such as probability sampling and non-probability sampling, data is acquired based on random and non-random criteria for decision-making.

• Measurement scales and instruments

Measurement scales and instruments are used to collect data from the customers. You have to choose your measurement scale based on the input type you expect from the customers.It can be the product rating from 0 to 10, very bad to very good, strongly agree to strongly disagree, etc.I found that some of the most common measurement scales used for research are Graphic Rating Scale, Likert Scale, Semantic Differential Scale, Stapel’s Scale, etc.

• Data collection and analysis methods

Finally, you have to decide on the data collection methods. There are several data collection methods described and mentioned so far, such as a survey, questionnaire, interview, focus group, diary study, etc.Besides that, you have to work on choosing analysis methods, including descriptive statistics, correlations, regression analysis, factor analysis, etc.Are There Any Challenges to Attitudinal Research?Amidst the several benefits of this research, I discovered that there are some challenges, too. Here are the primary challenges that you may face.

• Time-consuming

The overall process includes crafting the questions, sampling the data, interviewing the customers, and analyzing the data. All these processes take a lot of time and may even turn out to be expensive.

• User bias

I must tell you that not all the customers would provide you with fair input. Some of them may not remember the information correctly, and some of them may be speaking based on other people’s opinions, which creates a user bias.

• Reliability issues

Your research will always have reliability issues as all the respondents would not be honest and accurate in their feedback and opinions.ConclusionBeing the core of user research, attitudinal research helps uncover several aspects of the users and the market. Yes, the process can be pretty lengthy, but if you use the right ways of research, it can be simple and yield remarkable results.You need to make sure that you choose the right research tools and analysis methods. To make the most of your research project, you can rely on the resources of Qwary. Get in touch now and leverage the power of their user research resources.FAQs

1. What are attitudinal research methods?

Methods like surveys, user interviews, focus groups, and diary studies are counted under attitudinal research methods.

2. What's the difference between attitudinal and behavioral research?

Behavioral research deals with observing a person’s actions. On the other hand, attitudinal research refers to asking the user to self-report their opinions via methods such as surveys, focus groups, etc.

3. What are attitudinal variables?

Attitudinal variables uncover a customer’s beliefs, opinions, and attitudes towards a product or brand.

4. Why is attitude research important?

Attitudinal research is crucial because of several reasons, such as product improvement, innovation, future scope, better marketing, and brand perception.