User experience (UX) is a term that has been gaining a lot of momentum lately. For a company that provides products and services, UX is often thought to be a critical factor that significantly impacts its success. But what exactly is UX?

According to this paper, in spite of its increasing momentum, there is no real agreement on a definition of UX. Law et al.’s survey attempts to gain a wider perspective on researchers’ and practitioners’ perceptions of UX. This paper presents the results of the survey, along with the authors’ conclusions as to how they would define UX.

The bulk of the paper focuses on the survey and its results. The survey asked 275 researchers and practitioners involved with UX to complete three sections. In the first section, “UX Statements,” the respondents were asked to indicate how much they agreed or disagreed with a given statement pertaining to UX. In the second section, “UX Definitions,” the respondents provided their opinions of five different proposed definitions for UX. The final section, “Your Background,” solicited demographic information, including work experience and education.

While the survey is quite interesting, the findings, as presented in this paper, are hard to digest without a solid background in statistics. Understandably, the authors must demonstrate the accuracy of their results, but the excessive treatment of variables and confidence intervals limits what the layperson can take away from this paper.

Based on the results of the survey, Law et al. conclude that many researchers and practitioners tend to agree that UX is dynamic, context-dependent, and subjective.