Untitled Travel App

Description(To be Edited)

About

Goal of the App: To help travellers effortlessly document and share their journeys by integrating visual storytelling (photos), private reflections (notes), travel planning (itineraries), and public recommendations, all linked to an interactive map. As well as planning future trips.

Contextual Inquiry

Objectives

Observe how travellers document and share their journeys in real-life or simulated contexts.

Identify pain points and limitations in existing tools and journaling processes.

Explore how users plan trips, reflect on experiences, and give/share recommendations.

Understand user behaviours, motivations, and preferences around privacy, storytelling, and public sharing.

Method

To explore how users currently document and share their travel experiences, we conducted a Contextual Inquiry using semi-structured interviews as the primary method. This approach allowed us to gain in-depth insights into real user behaviours, motivations, and pain points in their natural context.

We selected 11 participants who had recently completed a trip or were active travellers. Participants were chosen to represent a diverse range of travel styles, including solo travellers, frequent business travellers, and people travelling with friends/partners.

Each interview lasted approximately 30 minutes and was conducted either in person or via video call, depending on participant availability. The interviews followed a semi-structured format, allowing for open-ended responses while ensuring that key themes—such as trip planning, memory documentation, journaling habits, and recommendation sharing—were consistently explored.

To ensure consistency and completeness during the sessions, we created a Google Form for the interviewer to fill out during or immediately after each interview. This helped standardise data collection across participants and ensured that no key questions or observations were missed. With participant consent, all interviews were also audio recorded to allow for more detailed review and analysis. The collected data was later analysed using a thematic analysis approach, allowing us to identify recurring patterns, common frustrations, and unmet needs. These insights directly informed our design decisions for the proposed travel app.

Participants

We recruited a total of 11 participants, all of whom were either frequent travelers or individuals who had recently completed a trip. The goal was to ensure relevance and freshness of experience in relation to travel journaling, planning, and sharing habits. Participants were selected to represent a diverse range of travel styles, including solo travellers, leisure travellers, business travellers, and students. This diversity allowed us to capture a wide spectrum of user needs, preferences, and challenges. All participants were briefed about the purpose of the study and gave informed consent before the interviews, including permission to record the sessions for research purposes.

Limitations

While the contextual inquiry provided valuable insights into user behaviours and pain points, several limitations should be noted:

1) Sample Size and Diversity: The number of participants was limited, which may not fully capture the breadth of travel styles, age groups, or cultural differences. As a result, the findings may not be generalizable to all user segments.

2) Simulated Contexts: Some interviews were conducted post-travel or in simulated planning scenarios rather than during actual travel. This may have influenced the accuracy or depth of recalled behaviours.

3) Interviewer Bias: Although a structured Google Form was used, the presence of the interviewer and subjective interpretation during observations and analysis may have introduced bias.

4) Technology-Comfort Bias: Most participants were relatively comfortable with technology, which may have excluded insights from less tech-savvy users who could struggle with app-based travel journaling.

Interview Questionnaire

1. Travel Habits

-How old are you?

-How often do you travel?

-Do you usually travel solo, in a group, or both?

-What type of trips do you usually take? (e.g. backpacking, city trips, digital nomad, road trips, etc.)

-How long are your trips?

2. Travel Documentation

-How do you currently document your trips? (Apps, journals, social media, photos only, etc.)

-Can you walk me through how you documented your last trip?

-What tools or apps do you use (if any)? (e.g. Polarsteps, Instagram, Google Docs, Notes app, written diary)

-What do you like about those tools?

-What annoys or frustrates you about them?

3. Sharing & Privacy

-Do you share your travel experiences with others? If yes, how and where?

-Who do you share your content with? (Public, friends, family, just for yourself)

-Do you ever keep private notes during a trip? Why or why not?

-How important is privacy to you when documenting a trip?

4. Planning & Inspiration

-How do you usually plan your trips? (Apps, blogs, word of mouth)

-Do you look at other people’s travel stories or recommendations while planning?

-Would it help to see what others enjoyed in a place you're going to?

5. Feature Feedback

-If you had an app where you could combine: Photo sharing, Private notes, Recommendations from others, Public/Private modes. Would that be useful for you? Why or why not?

-What one feature would you love in a travel app?

-What feature would you definitely not want?

-Is there anything else you'd like to add or think we should know?