The Design Psychologist | Psychology for UX, Product, Service, Instructional, Interior, and Game Designers

Season 1 Finale: Design for a Better World (w/ Don Norman)

 Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  What happens when hu

The Power of Social Proof (Part 2): 18 Methods Across 5 Psychological Drivers

 Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  Why does social proo

The Power of Social Proof (Part 1)

Go to thedesignpsychologist.substack.com to get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn.  Have you ever been in

Align Before Design: The Psychology of Strategic Alignment (with Tamara Adlin)

Get episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn:  thedesignpsychologist.substack.com Why do so many user personas f

Why Games Work: Emotional Arcs, Flow States, and Meaningful Play (with Jesse Schell)

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

Advance Without Alienating: How MAYA Drives Adoption

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 psycholog

Frontstage, Backstage: How Service Design Really Works (with Marc Stickdorn)

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

The Peak-End Rule in Design: What We Take Away

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 res

Less Load, More Learning: First Principles of Cognitive Load Theory (with John Sweller)

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, an

Designing with Tension: What the Zeigarnik Effect Reveals About Memory and Momentum

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 cognitiv

Closing the Knowing-Doing Gap: Designing for Real Behavior Change (with Julie Dirksen)

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— t

Order Matters—But Not the Way You Think: How Serial Position Gets Misused

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 i

From Vibes to Variables: How We’re Measuring the Unmeasurable in UX (with Bill Albert)

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 gue

The Shape of Choice: What Hick’s Law Really Reveals About Decision Time

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 expe

How to Visualize the Invisible: Metaphors, Models, and Meaning (with Stephen P. Anderson)

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

How Well Do Our Words Reflect Our Inside World? A psychological perspective on the limits of self-report, introspection, and understanding the human mind

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 intervie

Disruptive by Design: Uncovering Game-Changing Insights (with Larry Marine)

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

The Why Behind Sample Size: How Many People Do You Really Need to Test With?

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 use

How to Decode Conversation: A Paradigm Shift in Qualitative Insight and Human Understanding (with Indi Young)

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.  If you&a

Why It Feels Right: Affordance and the Mind’s Hidden Expectations

Why do some products feel natural the moment you touch them—while others are baffling from the start?  In this episode, we explore the psychology of affordances—those su