Peak-End Rule
People remember an experience by its best or worst moment and by how it ended.
What it is
Memory does not average an experience. It samples the most intense point and the final point and builds the story from those. Duration barely registers. A long, smooth engagement with a clumsy handover is remembered as clumsy. A rocky project with a great finish is remembered as great.
The research
Patients undergoing a colonoscopy rated the procedure as less unpleasant when it was extended by a period of mild discomfort at the end, because the ending was better.
Kahneman, Fredrickson, Schreiber and Redelmeier, 1993
How to use it
Design the last screen
The confirmation page, the final report, the last email of a sequence. Spend design time there.
Engineer one peak
Every onboarding needs a single moment of visible payoff. Find it and make it unmissable.
Fix the worst moment first
One painful step defines the memory of the whole flow. Find it in session recordings and remove it.
Related
Sources that shaped this entry: growth.design.