In this article, Georges Perec brought up three types of “ordinary” The extra-ordinary, the ordinary, and the infra-ordinary.

For some reason, humans beings are captivated by the extra-ordinary, the fascinating events in life. The clickbait headlines capture our attention easily. We are curious about scandals of celebrities that we do know personally, we are curious about the tragic accident that happened across the world, and most of the time, these events don’t even concern us. I must say that Perec’s take on the newspaper is one of a kind, as he finds the newspaper to be useless. Whereas most people find it important to read the news as it makes us well informed and aware of what is happening around us.

On the other hand, we tend to neglect the ordinary things around us and take it for granted. “We live, true, we breathe, true; we walk, we open doors, we go down staircases, we sit at a table in order to eat, we lie down on a bed in order to sleep. How? Why? Where? When? Why?” Perec wants us to dig deeper and give meaning to the infra-ordinary things in life. This is like peeling the layers of the onions and each time you peel off a new layer, you unravel something new. When we are curious about the infra-ordinary things, we ask people about their opinions and their perspectives. Curiosity helps us uncover new possibilities and help us develop empathy but I must admit that it is not easy. It takes time and conscious effort to be able “to question the habitual”.

I agree that being observant and asking questions is important in our design process, but it is not just about asking questions but asking the right question. During user research, we want to ask the users the right questions to be able to identify the underlying cause of the problem. For example – Describe what you like about this product VS Describe what you dislike about this product can elicit very different responses. The latter question may provide you with better insights.