User experience is the process carried out by the user when interacting with a product. Sometimes this concept is confused with usability. So, what is it that differentiates them?
Usability: is the ease with which people can use a particular tool or any other object in order to achieve a specific goal.
User experience: is the set of factors and elements related to the interaction of the user, with a specific environment or device, whose result is the generation of a positive or negative perception of said service, product or device.
Some possible results when, for example, we stop to analyze a web project are:
1. The product is usable but does not generate a great user experience.
2. The product is usable and also generates a great user experience.
3. The product is not usable but it generates a great user experience (this result is quite strange and would denote that something is being done wrong).
The perfect combination would be the second option: The product is usable and also generates a great user experience. If we achieve this, we will generate unique and notorious experiences for the user, which will bring us a great benefit.
One particularity of interest is that emotional aspects play a fundamental role in the user's interaction because emotional states affect the cognitive processes that influence the relationship of a user with a product.
By way of conclusion we can say that the User Experience:
• It is the result of an interactive phenomenon in which many individual, social, cultural, contextual
and product-specific factors intervene.
• It will be conditioned by expectations and previous experiences of the user.
• It offers a broader perspective on the use and consumption of interactive products, and therefore more in line with reality.
• It cares about factors sometimes not considered as the user's emotional behavior and the importance of design and aesthetics in this behavior.