Home
Podcasts
The Design Psychologist | Psychology for UX, Product, Service, Instructional, Interior, and Game Designers
The Design Psychologist | Psychology for UX, Product, Service, Instructional, Interior, and Game Designers
The Design Psychologist explores the intersection of psychology and design, hosted by Thomas Watkins, a design psychologist who applies behavioral science to digital products. Each episode features conversations with experts who use psychology in various design fields, offering practical advice and theoretical insights. The podcast aims to help designers create intuitive, effective, and delightful experiences.
Episodes
“Easy to Use” Means Six Different Things (w/ Marty Gage) | S2 E4
Send us Fan MailWhat makes a product feel not just usable, but desirable?In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Marty Gage, co-author of User Experience Research: Discover What Customers Really Want, about how teams can move beyond guessing and uncover the experiences people actually desire.Marty shares a practical framework for connecting emotional needs to product
The Question You Should Ask Before 'How Many Users?' (w/ Laura Faulkner) | S2 E3
Send us Fan MailHow many users do you actually need for a usability study?In this episode of The Design Psychologist, Thomas Watkins talks with Laura Faulkner about one of the most repeated ideas in UX research: that five users are enough. Laura explains why that rule of thumb can be useful in some situations, but dangerous when teams treat it like a law.They discuss sample size, research risk, st
Well-Tested, Easy to Use: How to Measure Any Product's Usability (w/ Philip Kortum) | S2 E2
Send us Fan MailWhat 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 scor
Season 2 Premiere: Should This Exist? UX Strategy in Uncertain Times (w/ Jaime Levy) S2 E1
Send us Fan MailHow 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 strat
Season 2 Trailer: The Design Psychologist
Send us Fan MailSeason 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
Season 1 Finale: Design for a Better World (w/ Don Norman)
Send us Fan Mail 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 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 interf
The Power of Social Proof (Part 2): 18 Methods Across 5 Psychological Drivers
Send us Fan Mail 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 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 studi
The Power of Social Proof (Part 1)
Send us Fan MailGo 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 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, e
Align Before Design: The Psychology of Strategic Alignment (with Tamara Adlin)
Send us Fan MailGet episode summaries right in your inbox so you can easily reference, save, and apply what you learn: thedesignpsychologist.substack.comWhy 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
Why Games Work: Emotional Arcs, Flow States, and Meaningful Play (with Jesse Schell)
Send us Fan MailWhy 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 reve
Advance Without Alienating: How MAYA Drives Adoption
Send us Fan MailWhat 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 EPIS
Frontstage, Backstage: How Service Design Really Works (with Marc Stickdorn)
Send us Fan MailWhat’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. They discuss the importance of community involvement and collaboration in shaping effective strate
The Peak-End Rule in Design: What We Take Away
Send us Fan MailWhat 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 psychologic
Less Load, More Learning: First Principles of Cognitive Load Theory (with John Sweller)
Send us Fan MailWhat’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 Sw
Designing with Tension: What the Zeigarnik Effect Reveals About Memory and Momentum
Send us Fan MailHave 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 en
Closing the Knowing-Doing Gap: Designing for Real Behavior Change (with Julie Dirksen)
Send us Fan MailWhy 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 d
Order Matters—But Not the Way You Think: How Serial Position Gets Misused
Send us Fan MailIn 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
From Vibes to Variables: How We’re Measuring the Unmeasurable in UX (with Bill Albert)
Send us Fan MailWhy 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 w
The Shape of Choice: What Hick’s Law Really Reveals About Decision Time
Send us Fan MailWhat 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 s
How to Visualize the Invisible: Metaphors, Models, and Meaning (with Stephen P. Anderson)
Send us Fan MailExplaining 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
How Well Do Our Words Reflect Our Inside World? A psychological perspective on the limits of self-report, introspection, and understanding the human mind
Send us Fan MailHow 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 ow
Disruptive by Design: Uncovering Game-Changing Insights (with Larry Marine)
Send us Fan MailEver 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,
The Why Behind Sample Size: How Many People Do You Really Need to Test With?
Send us Fan MailHow 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
How to Decode Conversation: A Paradigm Shift in Qualitative Insight and Human Understanding (with Indi Young)
Send us Fan MailIn 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'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 lis
Why It Feels Right: Affordance and the Mind’s Hidden Expectations
Send us Fan MailWhy 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 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
Designing for Risk: What Aviation and AR Reveal about Attention, Disaster, and Human Factors (with Chris Wickens)
Send us Fan MailIn 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. Together, they
How to Find the Next Big Idea: Deductive vs. Inductive Thinking in Product Research
Send us Fan MailHow 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 fo
The Six Minds of UX: A Design Checklist You Didn't Know You Needed (with John Whalen)
Send us Fan MailThis 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 p
Color Psychology in Design: What the Science Really Says
Send us Fan MailWhat 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—an
Psychology Principles Every Designer Should Master (with Susan Weinschenk)
Send us Fan MailToday 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
Design for Ease: The Psychology of Effort in UX Design
Send us Fan MailImagine 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
Trailer: Welcome to The Design Psychologist Podcast
Send us Fan MailIn 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, psychologi
Recommended
Dark Night Tales with Brian King
Fantasy Flex
زن بودن
Medicine with Meaning
Yours Truly Johnny Dollar Collection
Take Back Your Health®
CBS Radio Mystery Theater | Old Time Radio
Solved Murders - True Crime Stories
紐約鳥｜New York Aperture
The Swerve Podcast: Obscure Topics | Conspiracy Theories
The Bread and Banter Podcast
The Church of What's Happening Now: The New Testament
