Healthcare
They had solved the science. The communication was a different problem entirely.
The catch
Users believe they understand something that affects their health, and they don't. That's not a UX problem. That's a liability and an ethics problem.
The challenge
Find out whether people could actually understand their own genetic test results, not just whether they could click through the screens.
What I did
Ran usability and comprehension testing with 9 participants who had no genetics background, using a six-scenario matrix that varied results from normal to carrier to likely positive, so we'd see real reactions across the full range, not just one outcome
Comprehension testing surfaced the most important finding: participants consistently felt confident they understood their results. When tested directly, most couldn't accurately explain what they'd just read. No participant scored above 90% on the comprehension check. The gap between perceived understanding and actual understanding was the whole problem.
What changed
Confidence wasn't the same as comprehension.
The critical finding wasn't about navigation or layout. It was about a confidence gap: people felt like they understood, and they didn't. That distinction changed how the team thought about the product's job. It wasn't just to display results clearly. It was to verify understanding before letting someone move on. Specific moments in the flow, where users lost confidence or skipped past explanations, became checkpoints in the redesign. The product slowed down in the right places.
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