Navigating the Politics of Contextual Inquiry

As UX practitioners we must work to understand users’ conscious and unconscious actions, but how? We all know that users often misreport when asked questions, not because they are looking to intentionally deceive us, but because they are humans with their specializations, constructed self-images, and fallible memories. More often than not, they will lack the vocabulary of the discipline, tell you what they have come to believe, or say something incorrectly because they simply can’t remember after the fact.