General definition

First of all, it’s necessary to know where the word persona comes from:

Persona

- Latin - The mask of the actor in the theater.

- psychanalysis - According to Carl Gustav Jung, psychic instance of adaptation of a human being to social norms. Offers the possibility for an individual to hide behind a socially rewarding mask and to hide its weaknesses.

In these two definitions we find the notion of a “mask” that we are wearing to pretend to be someone else.

HMI design definition

In the area of ​​human-machine interface (HMI) design, it appears that digital projects are defined on a blurred user needs. These needs are perceived abstractly .

The use of persona as users archetypes with their own personalities, stories, desires and specific needs allows the designer to “face” the user.

In HMI design, therefore, it’s the scenarisation of a user based on an ethnographic approach that is called persona.

Benefits of the persona

To better understand what the person can bring to a project, let us look at its advantages: The use of personas by designer involves different psychological principles.

Empathy first, which corresponds to the ability to imagine the emotions and expectations of someone else until they feel as if they were her.

Mind theory, which consists in “putting yourself in the place of someone”, which makes allow to anticipate actions and behavior of a user.

And finally, the stereotypes theory, which allows from real-world data to create pragmatic and instantiated simplifications of real users.

Moreover, this improves the design creativity. Indeed studies have shown (Brangier and Al. 2012) that personas used in system design improves the quantity and quality of generated ideas.

To summarize

To summarize, a persona can be seen as a tool to facilitate future product interface or plateform design while remaining in line with the expectations and needs of customers/users.

Concrete example

To see a concrete example, I suggest you to read the case study on Personas creation @ 1001pharmacies.com