ENGL 8122  ※  User-Experience Research & Writitng

Case Studies

When a technical writer looks for work, they use samples of previous work as evidence of their abilities: reports, proposals, editorial before and afters, FAQs, websites, data visualizations, info-graphics, video how-to, and so on. While a digital object itself testifies to the writer's production skills, surrounding that object with a multimodal narrative that explains how they came up with that specific solution to a client's real world problem elevates the sample work to the level of a case study. UXers use case studies extensively both for archival and marketing purposes.

Because your final deliverable in this class is a case study, it is vital that you inform yourself about them, look at enough to generalize a pattern and find a couple of models to follow.

Examples of UX Case Studies

From spring 2024

  1. Contributed by Marian Russell, Rethinking Book Publishing for the Digital Age – a Case Study.

How-Tos

ChatGPT on UX Case Studies

George: Hey ChatGPT, Please define "case study" in a User Experience Context
ChatGPT:

A UX case study typically includes the following elements:

  1. Problem Statement: Describes the problem or challenge that the project aimed to solve, often framed in terms of user needs or pain points.
  2. Research and Analysis: Details the research methods used to understand user behavior, preferences, and pain points. This may include user interviews, surveys, usability testing, and competitive analysis.
  3. Design Process: Explains the design process, including ideation, wireframing, prototyping, and user testing. It should highlight key design decisions and iterations made throughout the project.
  4. User-Centered Solutions: Discusses the solutions that were implemented to address the identified user needs or problems. This may involve the design of user interfaces, interactions, or information architecture.
  5. Usability Testing: Presents findings from usability testing sessions, including user feedback, observations, and any design changes made based on the test results.
  6. Results and Impact: Discusses the outcomes of the project, such as improved user satisfaction, increased conversion rates, or other measurable improvements in the user experience.
  7. Reflection and Learnings: Reflects on what went well during the project and what could have been done differently. This helps in sharing insights and best practices for the UX community.
  8. Visuals and Assets: Includes visuals like screenshots, wireframes, prototypes, and any other design assets that help illustrate the process and the final product.

UX case studies are, in other words, both archives and marketing tools. They demonstrate success at solving real problems and show exactly how the solution was derived.

Copilot on UX Case Studies

Whenever possible, you should cross-check an AI's response with another's (or other sources of information). I asked MS's Copilot about UX case studies. Below is what it offered. Notice that it offered links.

George: Hey Copilot, In user experience research, the case study is a standard form of report. What are the common parts of a UX case study and what are some good examples?

Copilot: A UX case study is a document that describes the process and outcome of a UX design project. It showcases the skills and abilities of a UX designer, as well as the challenges and solutions they encountered. A UX case study can help potential clients or employers evaluate the quality and value of a UX design.

There are many ways to write a UX case study, but a common format consists of the following parts:

Some examples of UX case studies are:

I hope this helps you understand what a UX case study is and how to write one. If you have any questions or feedback, please let me know 😊 Source: Conversation with Bing, 11/16/2023

Case Study Generators

Every time you complete a project (UX or otherwise), you should add a case study about it to your portfolio. If you don't yet have any content for your portfolio, you can create hypothetical case studies to showcase how you would solve problems given the opportunity. Below are two links to Case Study Generators which offer prompts that might inspire you to design something you could then use to show the world how you can solve problems.

At the dawn of AI-assisted composition, I think anyone who wants to be a technical writer needs several case studies in their portfolio that demonstrate both effective prompt crafting and rhetorically asstute robot-prose editing. What the machines generate sounds like a machine generated it, for the most part. It's clear but uniform. I think companies want people who can produce a great deal more writing now than in the past, but they also don't want all that prose to sound machine-generated -- even flat gray needs a clear coat.

7 Best UX Case Study Generators (and how to use them)

...[T]these UX case study generators can help you create portfolio pieces and improve your UX/UI skills. Here are some of the best ones and the pros and cons of using them.

A UX Case Study Generator is a tool that serves up hypothetical UX design project ideas, problems, challenges or exercises that you can complete on your own to practice your UX skills or use to create UX Case studies and projects for UX/UI portfolio.

Uxtools Challenges