The Design Psychologist | Psychology for UX, Product, Service, Instructional, Interior, and Game Designers
Welcome to The Design Psychologist, a podcast where we explore the intersection of psychology and design. The show is hosted by Thomas Watkins, a design psychologist who has spent years applying behavioral science principles to the creation of digital products. We sit down with a variety of experts who apply psychology in different ways to the design of the world around us. Thomas uses his expertise to guide conversations that provide practical advice while illuminating the theory behind why designs succeed.  Tune in if you are a design practitioner who seeks to understand your work on a deeper level and cr...
Well-Tested, Easy to Use: How to Measure Any Product's Usability (w/ Philip Kortum)
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What does it actually mean to say a product is usable?
In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Phil Kortum about the System Usability Scale, or SUS: one of the most widely used tools for measuring usability. They discuss why this 10-item questionnaire has lasted for decades, what makes a usability metric trustworthy, and how researchers can use SUS scores to compare products, track improvement, and communicate usability in a shared language.
The conversation covers why a number is not automatically objective, how SUS differs...
Season 2 Premiere: Should This Exist? UX Strategy in Uncertain Times (w/ Jaime Levy)
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How do you know whether a product idea is worth building before you spend months designing and developing it?
In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Jaime Levy, author of UX Strategy, about how designers, researchers, founders, and product leaders can move beyond opinion and make a stronger evidence-based case for what to build.
Jaime explains why strategy is not about magically predicting the future, but about systematically reducing risk. She discusses how storyboards can help teams test the business idea before getting lost in...
Season 2 Trailer: The Design Psychologist
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Season 2 of The Design Psychologist is here.
After exploring the foundations of psychology across human factors, UX, instructional design, service design, game design, and more in Season 1, this season takes the conversation even further.
We’re asking some honest—and sometimes difficult—questions about where design psychology is today, the challenges professionals are facing in their careers, and how we can use design to create a better future.
Throughout Season 2, we’ll explore topics including accessibility, data visualization, helper robots, Jobs to Be Done vs. classica...
Season 1 Finale: Design for a Better World (w/ Don Norman)
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 Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.Â
What happens when human-centered design is no longer enough?
Designers are trained to make things easier to use—but what if ease and elegance are no longer the point? What if the systems we need to change go far beyond screens and interfaces, touching global structures and collective futures?
Our guest, Don Norman, coined the term "Norman Door" to desc...
The Power of Social Proof (Part 2): 18 Methods Across 5 Psychological Drivers
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 Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.Â
Why does social proof work?
And, what are some practical tips on how to use it to create better designs?
In part one of these Social Proof episodes, we started with the foundations of social psychology. We looked at the history, key studies, and some helpful frameworks.
Now in part two, we’re picking up where we left...
The Power of Social Proof (Part 1)
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Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.Â
Have you ever been in a crowd where no one clapped until one brave soul started the applause? Or walked past two restaurants—one bustling with a line out the door, the other nearly empty—and felt pulled toward the busy one?
These small, everyday moments reveal something big: we are profoundly influenced by the people around us, often witho...
Align Before Design: The Psychology of Strategic Alignment (with Tamara Adlin)
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Get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn: Â thedesignpsychologist.substack.com
Why do so many user personas fail in practice, and what can we do about it?
Have you ever worked on a team where everyone had a different idea of who the user was? Or watched a beautifully crafted persona become ignored or misused? You're not alone. In this episode, we explore why traditional personas often fall short—and how alignment personas can change eve...
Why Games Work: Emotional Arcs, Flow States, and Meaningful Play (with Jesse Schell)
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Why are games so deeply engaging? What psychological principles make game design such a powerful tool for shaping attention, emotion, and learning?
Game design is not a niche skill. It's one of the most refined disciplines we have for designing attention, emotion, and motivation. If you're designing anything for people, game design can sharpen your craft.
 This episode reveals how the craft of game design can teach us to build more immersive, emotionally resonant experiences. Whether you're designing products, learning experiences, or interactive systems, the lessons from games c...
Advance Without Alienating: How MAYA Drives Adoption
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What is the sweet spot between new and familiar, and how do you design for it?
Create products that feel groundbreaking and instantly intuitive by applying the psychology of the MAYA Principle.
By unpacking how humans respond to familiarity and novelty, you’ll gain practical guidance for designing experiences that spark excitement without overwhelming users.
WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE
What is the MAYA Principle, and why does it matter for product and experience design?How do familiarity and novelty interact to...Frontstage, Backstage: How Service Design Really Works (with Marc Stickdorn)
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What’s the real impact of service design on customer experiences?
In this episode of The Design Psychologist, host Thomas talks with service design expert Marc Stickdorn, PhD, author of "This is Service Design Doing," about the evolution and holistic nature of service design.Â
They discuss the importance of community involvement and collaboration in shaping effective strategies and enhancing user interactions across various touchpoints.
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WHAT WE COVER IN THIS EPISODE:Â
- The role of community contributions in redefining service design.
- Examp...
The Peak-End Rule in Design: What We Take Away
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What shapes the memory of an experience, and how can designers use that insight to create better, more human-centered products?
Design more memorable and emotionally resonant experiences by understanding how people actually remember what they go through. It turns out we do not remember experiences by their length, but by their intensity and how they end.
By uncovering the psychological principle known as the peak-end rule, you will learn how to shape experiences that stand out in people’s minds, leading to better outcomes and more impactful design.Â
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Less Load, More Learning: First Principles of Cognitive Load Theory (with John Sweller)
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What’s the best way to choose how you’ll teach something so it actually sticks?
Design your next lesson so learners don’t just follow along—they understand, remember, and apply their new skills.
By grounding your instruction in Cognitive Load Theory, you’ll gain a practical compass for sequencing content, trimming unnecessary load, and accelerating real mastery.
Our guest, Dr. John Sweller, pioneered Cognitive Load Theory during more than four decades as Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of New South Wales. His research has reshap...
Designing with Tension: What the Zeigarnik Effect Reveals About Memory and Momentum
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Have you ever noticed how an unfinished task — or a cliffhanger at the end of a show — keeps tugging at your attention?
How can the Zeigarnik effect’s lingering cognitive tension help us design products, services, and experiences that people actually come back to and complete?
When you learn to harness the motivational pull of “unfinished business,” you can turn mundane flows into engaging journeys and guide users toward the outcomes that matter.
 We explore why interruptions strengthen memory, and how designers can translate that insight into progress indicators...
Closing the Knowing-Doing Gap: Designing for Real Behavior Change (with Julie Dirksen)
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Why is it so hard to change behavior—even when people already know exactly what to do?
Design your next learning experience so people don’t just understand what to do— they actually do it.
By uncovering the psychology behind the knowing–doing gap, you’ll gain practical tools to move your audience from passive understanding to sustained action.
Our guest, Julie Dirksen, has spent two decades helping organizations design training and products that lead to measurable behavior change.Â
WHAT WE C...
Order Matters—But Not the Way You Think: How Serial Position Gets Misused
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In this episode, we uncover how the order in which information is presented affects what users remember—and what they forget. From the “primacy effect” that gives early items a cognitive boost, to the “recency effect” that gives the last ones staying power, you'll learn how sequence can make or break a design.
We explore:
Why we remember the first and last items in a list better than the middle onesWhy many designers mistakenly apply memory principles to visual design when they should be focusing on attentionThe difference between designing for memory...From Vibes to Variables: How We’re Measuring the Unmeasurable in UX (with Bill Albert)
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Why is it so hard to know whether people want to use what we design—not just whether they can?
Design research can (and should) go far beyond basic task success. Our guest Bill Albert joins us to show how to expand our measurement toolbox.
By learning to measure desirability, emotion, and true engagement, we unlock clearer insights, align teams faster, and invest only in ideas that will actually re...
The Shape of Choice: What Hick’s Law Really Reveals About Decision Time
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What happens when your design asks users to make too many choices? In this solo episode, we explore a deceptively simple principle with massive implications for user experience: Hick’s Law.
This law explains why more options mean more decision time—and why that’s not always a good thing.
From cluttered navigation to bloated dropdowns, we’ll break down how cognitive overload quietly slows users down. You'll learn when reducing choices helps, when it hurts, and how to use psychological insights to guide your interface design decisions.
By und...
How to Visualize the Invisible: Metaphors, Models, and Meaning (with Stephen P. Anderson)
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Explaining an abstract idea can feel easy—until you put pen to paper. In this episode, our host sits down with Stephen P. Anderson to unpack the craft of turning complex concepts into clear, memorable visuals. Together they dig into the challenges of sketching an org chart, mapping a process, or nailing a scientific metaphor—and ask what really separates a helpful illustration from a confusing one.Â
You’ll hear them explore:Â
Why visualizing a concept (not just data) often stalls once you start drawingWhether effective illustration relies on a repeatab...How Well Do Our Words Reflect Our Inside World? A psychological perspective on the limits of self-report, introspection, and understanding the human mind
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How much can you trust what users tell you?
In this solo episode, we dive into one of the most slippery yet essential tools in UX research: self-reporting. From interviews to surveys, self-reports are everywhere—but they come with hidden psychological traps.
We explore:
Why self-reported data can be both useful and misleadingThe psychological reasons people often misrepresent their own behaviorWhen to trust what users say—and when to dig deeperThe subtle difference between described and observed behaviorIf you’ve ever relied on use...
Disruptive by Design: Uncovering Game-Changing Insights (with Larry Marine)
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Ever wonder how certain products feel inevitable the moment they appear—rearranging entire markets overnight? In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas sits down with UX pioneer Larry Marine to unpack the mechanics of truly disruptive research—the kind that yields insights so fundamental they can’t be unseen.
Most teams unknowingly skip a handful of critical research steps, blinding themselves to the knowledge that changes everything. Larry shows us how treating users, tasks, and entire processes as flows of knowledge reframes both what you look for and what you ultima...
The Why Behind Sample Size: How Many People Do You Really Need to Test With?
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How many participants do you need to test in order to make valid research claims? In this episode, we dive deep into the science and psychology behind sample sizes in user testing. Whether you're working with five users or five hundred, the number you choose can shape the story your research tells—and how credible your findings appear to stakeholders.
Why sample size is one of the most misunderstood elements in product researchThe psychological impact of “too few” vs. “just enough” users in high-stakes design reviewsWhether the popular idea that "you only need to te...How to Decode Conversation: A Paradigm Shift in Qualitative Insight and Human Understanding (with Indi Young)
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In this episode of The Design Psychologist, we dive deep into the world of qualitative research and human-centered design with legendary UX thinker Indi Young.Â
If you've ever felt like your user interviews only skim the surface—or if you've relied too heavily on personas—you might be missing the most powerful insights. Indi joins us to explore how deep, non-judgmental listening can revolutionize your understanding of users and, ultimately, your design outcomes.Â
Together, we tackle questions like:
What is deep listening, and why is it essential in design...Why It Feels Right: Affordance and the Mind’s Hidden Expectations
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Why do some products feel natural the moment you touch them—while others are baffling from the start?Â
In this episode, we explore the psychology of affordances—those subtle cues that tell us what to do next, without saying a word. From door handles to digital apps, we break down how great design speaks directly to human intuition.
You’ll learn:
The psychological principles that make interfaces feel “just right”What Don Norman meant by affordances, signifiers, and anti-affordances
How to avoid common desi...
Designing for Risk: What Aviation and AR Reveal about Attention, Disaster, and Human Factors (with Chris Wickens)
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In this episode, Thomas interviews Dr. Chris Wickens, a pioneer in cognitive engineering and human factors, and they discuss how designers can reduce errors and enhance decision-making when lives are on the line. They delve into the high-stakes world of design psychology for critical environments—think operating rooms, airplane cockpits, and military control systems.Â
Together, they explore the real science of attention, what causes overload and confusion in high-pressure moments, and how augmented reality could revolutionize user interfaces in critical settings. Whether you're designing for surgeons, pilots, or autonomous vehicles, this epi...
How to Find the Next Big Idea: Deductive vs. Inductive Thinking in Product Research
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How do you figure out what features to build into your design?
How do you get those magical insights that actually improve your product—versus just shifting things around?
In this episode, we unpack one key distinction that helps design psychologists and UX researchers choose the right method at the right time: inductive vs. deductive research.
Imagine you have two different ideas for how to design an app for restaurant waitstaff. You think of adding some possible features, like a picture-based layout, or a li...
Design for Ease: The Psychology of Effort in UX Design
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Imagine dragging a jammed suitcase through a crowded airport—frustrating, right? Now imagine that same experience happening in your app, your website, or your product design. That’s performance load: the hidden mental and physical effort users endure when your design isn’t working for them.
In this episode, we take our first step into the world of design psychology by exploring the concept of performance load. You’ll learn how cluttered interfaces, too many clicks, and confusing layouts quietly pile up work on your users. And more importantly, you’ll discover h...
Psychology Principles Every Designer Should Master (with Susan Weinschenk)
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Today on The Design Psychologist, we're diving deep into the intersection of psychology and design with none other than Susan Weinschenk, PhD—the person you’ll literally find next to the term “design psychologist” in the dictionary. Susan is a pioneer in applying behavioral science to UX and product design, and the author of essential books like How to Get People to Do Stuff and 100 Things Every Designer Needs to Know About People.Â
In this conversation, we explore Susan's journey from psychology to design, how human factors evolved into today’s UX...
Color Psychology in Design: What the Science Really Says
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What does the color of your brand really say about your business? Is there truth behind the popular color psychology charts? In this episode, we cut through the noise and explore the actual science behind color psychology—what it tells us, what it doesn't, and what that means for your branding decisions.
We’ll explore:
Why some color associations (like “blue = trust”) persist—and whether they hold up under scrutinyThe surprising cultural roots behind color meanings (hint: pink wasn’t always for girls)The science of how color affects our emotions—and...The Six Minds of UX: A Design Checklist You Didn't Know You Needed (with John Whalen)
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This episode is an absolute masterclass in human-centered design, featuring Dr. John Whalen—cognitive scientist, seasoned UX expert, and author of Design for How People Think.
John introduces us to his powerful framework, The Six Minds of UX, which breaks down the complexity of user experience into six distinct cognitive lenses. Whether you’re designing a website, app, service, or physical product, these six minds offer a foolproof checklist to make sure you’re not leaving any critical piece of the human experience behind.
In this episode, we explore:
What...Trailer: Welcome to The Design Psychologist Podcast
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In this teaser episode, host Thomas Watkins introduces The Design Psychologist—a podcast where human behavior meets design. Thomas shares what inspired him to bridge the gap between psychology and design, outlines what listeners can expect in future episodes, and invites you to explore how design shapes our thoughts, emotions, and actions. Whether you're a designer, psychologist, or curious thinker, this show is your gateway into the minds behind meaningful design.Â
