Annexure B · Survey Instrument
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Annexure B

Survey Instrument.

Practitioner survey targeting 30 to 50 respondents in customer experience (primary) and educational technology (secondary). Four objectives: current-state benchmarking, signal recognition prevalence, signal-to-state mapping agreement, and framework utility scoring.

Format
Online questionnaire
Duration
~5 minutes
Sample
n = 30–50
Distribution
LinkedIn, mentor network, EMBA alumni
Section A

Current-State Benchmarking

Establishes which ABSD layers practitioner systems currently operate at.
  1. Single select
    Which best describes your primary professional domain?
    Customer Experience
    Educational Technology
    Other (please specify)
  2. Multi-select
    Which of the following does your AI system currently capture or analyse?
    Discrete user actions (clicks, page views, purchases)
    Behavioural patterns over time (engagement trends, session-to-session changes)
    User emotional or cognitive states (frustration, confusion, satisfaction)
    Underlying user motivations or psychological drivers
  3. Likert 1–5
    On a scale of 1 to 5, how well does your current system understand why users behave the way they do?
    1
    2
    3
    4
    5
    Not at allVery well
Section B

Signal Recognition Prevalence

Which of the seven behavioural signals practitioners observe in their own products.
  1. Multi-select
    Which of the following behavioural signals do you observe or track in your product?
    Hesitation or pause patterns
    Rapid navigation or switching between features
    Re-engagement after a period of inactivity
    Help-seeking behaviour (documentation, support, tooltips)
    Changes in interaction pace or session tempo
    Regression to previously completed content or steps
    Error tolerance patterns (retry vs. abandon)
  2. Ranking — top 3
    Select your top three from the list above that are most informative for understanding your users.
  3. Open text
    Are there behavioural signals available in your data that your team does not currently use? If yes, what prevents you from using them?
Section C

Signal-to-State Mapping Agreement

Whether practitioner inferences converge with the framework's mappings.
  1. Single select
    A user pauses for 20 seconds before completing a key action. In your domain, what is the most likely explanation?
    Confusion or uncertainty
    Careful deliberation
    Distraction
    Cognitive overload
    Other
  2. Single select
    A user rapidly switches between three features without completing any task. What does this most likely indicate?
    Frustration
    Exploration or curiosity
    Inability to find what they need
    Comparison shopping
    Other
  3. Single select
    A user who previously engaged daily has reduced to weekly sessions over three weeks. What is the most likely driver?
    Frustration of core needs (no longer feel competent or successful using the tool)
    External life circumstances
    Product no longer meeting their needs
    Found an alternative
    Other
  4. Likert 1–5
    How often does the same behavioural signal mean different things depending on the context?
    1
    2
    3
    4
    5
    RarelyAlmost always
Section D

Framework Utility

After a brief ABSD framework introduction.
  1. Likert 1–5 · framework intro shown first
    Intro: The ABSD framework proposes four layers of user understanding — Action (what users do), Behaviour (patterns in how they do it), State (what they feel), and Drive (why they do it).

    On a scale of 1 to 5, how useful would this layered structure be for your product or analytics work?
    1
    2
    3
    4
    5
    Not usefulVery useful
  2. Single select
    Which ABSD layer represents the biggest gap in your current system?
    Action
    Behaviour
    State
    Drive
  3. Single select
    If your system could reliably infer user states (e.g., frustration, confidence, disengagement), what is the primary way you would alter its response?
    Trigger autonomous agent interventions (automated support)
    Adapt the UI complexity in real time (simplify the interface)
    Alter the tone or pacing of content
    Route the user to a human agent immediately
    Other
  4. Single select
    What is the single biggest barrier to implementing deeper user understanding in your system?
    Technical complexity
    Data availability
    Organisational priorities
    Ethical or privacy concerns
    Lack of a guiding framework
    Other
  5. Single select
    Would you use the ABSD framework as a reference in your product design or analytics discussions?
    Yes, immediately applicable
    Potentially, with modifications
    Not in its current form
    Not relevant to my work