Exploring designers' expectations from a virtual reality user insight tool: KitchXR

Abstract

This paper investigates how designers envision using virtual reality as a spatial interaction tool for collecting user insights during product development. We developed KitchXR, a virtual kitchen prototype, to elicit expectations from 17 professionals in the home appliance industry, including UX/UI designers, industrial designers, and consumer insight specialists via an expert evaluation study. Through thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews, we identify key challenges in current UX research workflows, particularly limited access to user data and constraints on the timing of insight collection. Our findings highlight 3 opportunity areas for VR-based user insight tools: (1) enabling complex and context-rich testing scenarios, (2) integrating bio-sensory and behavioral data, and (3) supporting the revisitation of early design decisions. By centering designers as users of spatial interaction tools, this study contributes to emerging discourse at the intersection of extended reality, user research, and collaborative design workflows.