UX Researcher III- #26-17772

Duration:12 months

Location:Redmond, WA

Description:

Client brings together researchers, developers, and engineers to create the future of augmented and virtual reality. The Audio Research team is focused on harnessing the power of AR to give audio superpowers to billions of people, forever transforming the way we work, play, and connect. As a UX Researcher, you’ll be responsible for uncovering the user insights and feedback that guide our early research and advanced development toward experiences that are useful, usable, and desirable.

Strong candidates will demonstrate a rigorous, primarily quantitative approach to UX research with qualitative fluency and have experience developing audio-related solutions. You will work with other UX researchers as well as multi-disciplinary hardware and software teams to push the boundaries of what is possible in the AR product and research science spaces. Ultimately, your expertise and ingenuity in research must do more than just contribute to knowledge – you must also be skilled at driving measurable positive impact and user experience.

Responsibilities:

• Design & conduct research to guide the development of Client audio-centric augmented reality (AR) and smart glasses user experiences, with a focus on hearing-related features, leveraging primarily quantitative UX research approaches and tools such as lab-based experimentation, psychophysical/psychoacoustic methods, statistical analysis, and surveys, supplemented by qualitative methods as needed.
• Work closely with engineering and stakeholders to shape and develop iterative perceptual evaluations, translating technical research questions into rigorous user-centered study designs.
• Support research execution as part of an on-team evaluation program, coordinating regular feature evaluation sessions to gather feedback and inform development priorities.
• Evaluate and iterate on hearing features by understanding how users perceive, interact with, and benefit from augmented audio experiences.
• Translate the research insights into actionable, measurable UX recommendations and drive implementation with cross functional partners.
• Independently complete research, including data collection, data analysis, reporting, collaborating with teams to act upon research results, and knowledge consolidation.

Minimum Qualifications:

• MS in Human Factors, Cognitive Psychology, Neuropsychology, Perceptual Psychology, Speech and Hearing Sciences, or a UX related field.
• 2 years experience conducting applied research on consumer products with an emphasis on both lab-based and remote quantitative methods in industry.
• Proficiency in inferential statistics and experimental design.
• Experience developing and implementing custom research metrics or scoring frameworks to evaluate perceptual or user experience quality.
• Experience with qualitative research methods (e.g., interviews, usability studies).
• 1 year of working in cross-functional teams.

Preferred Qualifications:

• PhD in Human Factors, Cognitive Psychology, Neuropsychology, Perceptual Psychology, Speech and Hearing Sciences, or a UX related field.
• Experience synthesizing qualitative insights to inform product direction.
• 2 years of experience conducting attitudinal or behavioral research with audio and audio-related devices (e.g., HMDs, smart glasses, headphones, smart speakers, and more).
• Experience using psychophysical/psychoacoustic methods.
• Experience creating Client evaluation metrics and implementing them programmatically (e.g., Python, R, MATLAB) to support iterative research workflows.
• Advanced proficiency in statistical analysis and data visualization (e.g., R, Python).
• Strong oral and written communication skills with experience in tailoring messages to various stakeholders.
• This position is based in Redmond, WA (RED).

What makes this role interesting:

As a quantitative UX researcher on the RLR-Audio team, you play an important role in covering broad ground to ensure a high-value UX for our features in development. The opportunity here involves leveraging rigorous quantitative methods – including controlled experimentation and statistical analysis – and qualitative approaches to deeply understand user needs, desires, and pain points, working to better understand the range of audio features that users desire and working with researchers, scientists, engineers and prototypers to evaluate how research participants interact with and experience prototypes in the domain of augmenting sounds in your scene (including, but not limited to, conversations).

Your work will focus on hearing features – understanding how users experience augmented audio, conversation enhancement technologies, and audio-focused accessibility in real-world contexts. You will be embedded in an on-team evaluation program - a structured cadence of feature evaluation sessions where engineering and research come together to test, experience, and critique audio prototypes in development. Your role is to bring scientific rigor to these sessions: designing evaluation protocols, developing perceptual metrics, and translating session outcomes into actionable feedback that directly shapes the next iterations.

Value added or experience gained:

Opportunity to guide early-stage research prototypes refining our understanding of user needs through rigorous quantitative evaluation.

Surrounding team & key projects:

This UXR will be working on the RLR-Audio team, supporting evaluation of the user experience of Client audio and hearing feature ideas and existing prototypes through both quantitative metrics and qualitative user insights.

Top 3 must-have HARD skills:

• Strong foundation in quantitative research (with qualitative fluency), especially experimental design, inferential statistics, and data visualization.
• Prior experience conducting lab-based perceptual or behavioral studies in an audio-related field (e.g., hearing science, audio quality evaluation, spatial audio, etc.).
• Proficiency with standardized perceptual/audio evaluation methodologies (e.g., MUSHRA, paired comparisons, adaptive staircase procedures).

Good to have skills:

• Experience working on hearing-related topics in research or applied settings.
• Enough audio and tech awareness/skills to not need hand holding in explaining our context (at least one of: prior audio quality evaluation experience, hearing correction/audiology exposure, speech communication research experience, work in audio-focused consumer electronics).
• Prior experience in qualitative methods, including interviews and usability tests.

Years of experience required:

2 years experience conducting applied research on consumer products with emphasis on quantitative methods in industry.

Degrees or certifications required:

MS in Human Factors, Cognitive Psychology, Neuropsychology, Perceptual Psychology, Hearing Sciences, or a UX related field. PhD preferred.

About US Tech Solutions:

US Tech Solutions is a global staff augmentation firm providing a wide range of talent on-demand and total workforce solutions. To know more about US Tech Solutions, please visit www.ustechsolutions.com.

US Tech Solutions is an Equal Opportunity Employer. All qualified applicants will receive consideration for employment without regard to race, colour, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, disability, or status as a protected veteran.

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