Nielsen (2019) defines the difference between Sympathy and Empathy in UX and explains how even though the words are commonly placed together, there is a difference in how they are perceived. This is known to create confusion which results in UX designers not addressing what users need in interfaces.
Sympathy in UX
“Sympathy is the acknowledgement of the suffering of others.” (Nielsen Norman Group, 2019)
- users are aware of the situation however there is still some dustance between them and the issue.
Empathy in UX
Empathy is the ability to fully understand, mirror, and then share another person’s expressions, needs, and motivations. (Nielsen Norman Group, 2019)
- Users are able to fully understand the issue and therefore are able to put themselves in other people’s shoes. Empathy is a more complex nature than sympathy
Neilson highlights the spectrum of empathy and explains the different engagement strategies of how users engage in interfaces.
https://www.nngroup.com/articles/sympathy-vs-empathy-ux/
It is clear that empathy is complex in nature which makes it difficult for UX designers to fully incorporate it into user interfaces. To assist designers Neilson sets out a list of techniques that can be used:
- Use Qualitative Research Methods
- Recruit Diverse Users
- Have Your Team Watch Research Sessions and See Real Users
- Use Videos of Users Whenever Presenting Research Findings to Stakeholders
- Make an Empathy Map
- Invest in a Diverse Team
- Build Empathy into Your Design Guidelines
- Card Sorting
Empathy is very important in my current projects as my aim is to get my users to feel a sense of trust. In order to succeed in creating effective projects, my aim is to adopt a couple of the techniques and portray them in my projects such as conducting card sorting.