Recommended Books

Research That Scales: The Research Operations Handbook

Kate Towsey

Design for Impact: Your Guide to Designing Effective Product Experiments

Erin Weigel

The User Experience Team of One, 2nd edition: A Research and Design Survival Guide

Leah Buley and Joe Natoli

Think Like a UX Researcher: How to Observe Users, Influence Design, and Shape Business Strategy

David Travis

Quantifying the User Experience: Practical Statistics for User Research

Jeff Sauro

Quantitative User Experience Research: Informing Product Decisions by Understanding Users at Scale

Chris Chapman

Measuring the User Experience: Collecting, Analyzing, and Presenting UX Metrics

Bill Albert

Research Practice: Perspectives from UX researchers in a changing field

Gregg Bernstein

UX Research: Practical Techniques for Designing Better Products

Brad Nunnally

Eye Tracking in User Experience Design

Jennifer Romano Bergstrom

It’s Our Research: Getting Stakeholder Buy-in for User Experience Research Projects

Tomer Sharon

The Moderator’s Survival Guide: Handling Common, Tricky, and Sticky Situations in User Research

Donna Tedesco

Interview Techniques for UX Practitioners: A User-Centered Design Method

Chauncey Wilson

Observing the User Experience: A Practitioner’s Guide to User Research

Elizabeth Goodman

Moderating Usability Tests: Principles and Practices for Interacting

Joseph S. Dumas

Usability Testing Essentials: Ready, Set…Test!

Carol M. Barnum

Browse this book collection on Amazon ↗

Related Links and Articles

• Digital.gov: introduction to user researchA public-service perspective on using research to uncover needs and improve solutions.
• user research and collaboration methodsMethods for learning from users and collaborating throughout the research process.
• a sample research planGuidance on defining research questions, participants, methods, and a workable study plan.
• a usability-test scriptA practical guide and sample script for planning and conducting usability tests.
• A List Apart user research articlesArticles on learning from people and applying research to design decisions.
• Synthetic Users vs. Human Respondents: Same Conclusion, Less Variation (Nielsen Norman Group, October 2026)A comparison of synthetic and human responses, including differences in variation.

Supportive Professional Organizations

• User Experience Professionals Association (UXPA)
• ACM Special Interest Group on Computer Human Interaction (SIGCHI)
• IxDA local communities and interaction design archive (IxDA)

Cory’s related writing

• ADHD Diaries: How I got lost in a museum and why this makes me a really good researcherCory reflects on how getting lost in a museum connects with his strengths as a researcher.
• Evolution of user research jobsCory looks at how user research careers have developed and where they may be heading.
• Appropriate expectations –> Happy stakeholders –> Successful usability testingCory discusses setting stakeholder expectations for a successful usability study.
• Observing Usability Studies: A Guide for StakeholdersCory offers guidance for stakeholders who observe usability research sessions.
• How to moderate usability testing with simultaneous translationCory discusses moderating usability studies that involve simultaneous translation.
• Research Recruitment Fail: Now what?Cory considers what to do when participant recruitment does not go as planned.

Compensation Data

• Glassdoor Salary Data (includes common UX job titles)
• UXPA Salary Survey (2024 data)
• User Experience Salaries & Calculator (2024) (MeasuringU, 2024 data). Open salary analysis and calculator; includes UXPA survey data.

Other job titles that may involve user research work: UX Specialist, Usability Engineer/Specialist/Expert, Human Factors Engineer/Specialist (which may not actually indicate someone doing the human factors work that is discussed in the book’s Human Factors pathway)