User behavior types of music playlist creation: How do users create music playlists on music streaming services?

Idea

Today’s music streaming services (e.g., Spotify, Deezer) allow users to create music playlists. Little is known about how users approach and accomplish this playlist-creation task. Previous research indicates that users employ different strategies to create playlists. The goal is to explore and capture users’ (different) strategies and processes to craft their playlists. Specific aspects include a user’s search strategy and the use of automatic recommendations in the playlist creation process. Particular attention should be paid to using other user interface (UI) elements and functionalities—either in the elements’ intended way or as a workaround. The outcome should be (i) a typology of user behavior of music playlist creation and (ii) derived design implications to support music playlist creation (if possible, for the different user types).

Research questions

• What behavioral patterns characterize playlist-creation processes?
• Can these differences be used to classify users into user types of playlist creation—and how?
• How can the different user types be supported (with UI elements and functionality) in the playlist-creation task?

Proposed methodology/methods

Contextual inquiry, Thematic analysis

Type of contribution:

• Primarily: Typology
• Secondary: User requirements