17 Aug Metaphor as Frame, Not Verdict: Rethinking the ‘User Journey’ in UX Research
Introduction — The Tension
Metaphors are shortcuts to understanding. They compress complexity into something we can name, point to, and discuss. In multidisciplinary teams, they give everyone—from engineers to product managers—a shared reference point. They orient attention and provide a common language for navigating ambiguous problems.
But this same clarity can close things down. Once a metaphor becomes the lens, it starts to shape what we notice and, just as importantly, what we overlook. It can move from being a provisional frame to an unquestioned verdict, silently filtering reality to fit its structure.
John Stuart Mill warned in A System of Logic against mistaking figurative language for literal truth. Cognitive linguists George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, in Metaphors We Live By, went further: metaphors do not merely decorate thought, they structure it. They influence the very questions we ask and the answers we find acceptable.
In UX, few metaphors illustrate this double edge more clearly than the “user journey.” And, as we will see, the same risks emerge when any framing metaphor crosses from internal shorthand to external influence — such as the “inspiration hub.”
Step 1 — How Metaphors Frame
A well-chosen metaphor can quickly align a team’s mental model.
Describing a service as an ecosystem invites thinking about interdependence, cycles, and balance.
Calling onboarding a conversation emphasises tone, reciprocity, and responsiveness.
Lakoff and Johnson’s work explains why these frames feel natural: they draw on embodied schemas—patterns from our physical experience (e.g., container, path, source–goal)—to structure abstract concepts. These scaffolds give early orientation, speeding up shared understanding.
Mill’s caution is to treat these scaffolds as temporary. They are not the thing itself, only a way of seeing it.
Step 2 — The ‘User Journey’ as a Case Study
The user journey offers narrative clarity: a start, a path, an end. It’s easy to map: stages, emotions, touchpoints neatly in order. In workshops, it creates a satisfying storyline that stakeholders can rally around.
And it can be genuinely useful:
• Makes sequences visible for discussion.
• Helps spot friction and delight.
• Encourages empathy by asking teams to “walk in the user’s shoes.”
But its embodied foundation—the Source–Path–Goal schema—also embeds unspoken entailments:
• There is a single, optimal path.
• All users move in the same direction.
• Progress is the goal.
Real-world behaviour rarely fits this arc. People loop, pause, skip steps, start mid-way, or re-enter from unexpected points. Yet in many projects, those deviations are dismissed as “exceptions” rather than signals.
Step 3 — When the Frame Decides for Us
Mill’s warning becomes visible here: the diagram begins to dictate the insight.
I have seen research plans shaped to follow the “ideal” journey, meaning edge cases never even enter the data. Observations that contradict the linear path are reframed to fit it. The metaphor stops guiding inquiry and starts policing it.
This phenomenon is not unique to UX. In healthcare, “journey” metaphors are sometimes used to describe treatment experiences. While well-intentioned, they can be disempowering if they imply that not reaching a cure equals “failure.” In both domains, a neat, linear metaphor can distort reality—oversimplifying complexity and undervaluing non-linear truths.
Step 4 — When a Framing Metaphor Leaks Out
A framing metaphor is language chosen inside a team to help make sense of something complex. It is not meant as a literal description, but as a way to organise thinking and focus discussion. “Hub,” “ecosystem,” “journey,” “blueprint” — all of these are frames. They guide what we notice, how we categorise, and what relationships we expect to see.
The inspiration hub example shows both the strength and the risk.
In one project, “inspiration hub” was a convenient internal shorthand for a campaign landing page. It worked in the team because:
• Hub implied centrality and connection — all campaign assets and ideas radiating from one place.
• Inspiration implied the tone and emotional purpose — energising, motivating, creative.
Inside the team, this was a helpful frame: it kept discussions focused on creating a rich, centralised content space.
But during usability testing, using “inspiration hub” with participants subtly shaped their expectations. Some assumed they would find original creative ideas rather than curated campaign materials. Others expected a more interactive or community-driven space — “hub” triggered a mental model closer to a social or collaborative platform.
The metaphor had leaked from internal alignment to external influence. At that point, it stopped being a neutral frame for us and became part of the participant’s mental model, which then shaped their behaviour in the test. It is easy to overlook that what feels like harmless shorthand internally may plant misleading expectations externally.
Step 5 — The Risk of Carrying a Metaphor Outside the Team
The shift from internal to external use changes the stakes:
• Internally, a metaphor is scaffolding: it speeds shared understanding, creates alignment, and allows for productive shortcuts in conversation.
• Externally, it becomes a promise. Users and participants are likely to interpret it literally or extend it based on their own experiences.
The result can be:
• Skewed test behaviour (participants searching for features that were never intended).
• Misaligned expectations at launch (customers feel something is “missing” even if the design meets its functional goals).
• Confusion about the product’s scope or intent.
The principle is the same as with “user journey”: the frame should guide our thinking, but we must remain aware of when it risks becoming a verdict — in this case, a verdict about what the product is in the minds of the people using it.
Step 6 — Containing the Frame
When a framing metaphor is only meant for internal orientation:
• Keep it in team documentation, not in user-facing labels or test scripts.
• Translate it into plain, functional language before exposing it to participants.
• If you must use it externally, test the metaphor itself first to understand what expectations it triggers.
Step 7 — Why Letting Go Is Hard
Lakoff and Johnson show that metaphor’s grip is not just cultural; it’s cognitive. The journey metaphor feels right because it mirrors how we move through space. “Hub” feels right because it mirrors how we organise physical spaces. That “naturalness” makes them powerful — and makes them harder to challenge.
This is why simply “naming” a metaphor isn’t enough. These frames are embedded in how we think, not just in the words we use. They become mental defaults, making alternative framings feel alien or “wrong.”
Step 8 — Counter-Frames and Cross-Checks
Keeping metaphors in their place requires both individual discipline and team culture:
- Name the metaphor early. State it as a choice, not an inevitability. This creates room to revisit it later.
- Pair it with counter-metaphors. If “journey” dominates, introduce “constellation” (non-linear, multi-entry), “ecosystem” (interdependence, cycles), or “conversation” (reciprocal, adaptive).
- Test against evidence. When data conflicts with the metaphor, resist bending it to fit. Let the data redraw the frame.
- Evolve over time. A journey might suit discovery, but a network map or storyboard may better represent synthesis.
- Allow metaphor-free analysis. Periodically strip away the frame and look at the data without any imposed structure.
Step 9 — Organisational and Cultural Conditions
These practices require a cultural shift. Teams need permission to “play” with conceptual models and to question foundational frames without fear of slowing progress. That means valuing intellectual flexibility over mere efficiency.
Tools and language also matter. Common UX artefacts (“conversion funnel,” “onboarding flow”) can silently reinforce entrenched frames. Becoming aware of these defaults is part of developing metaphorical literacy.
Step 10 — Practical Use Across Research Phases
• Discovery: Use metaphors to quickly orient the team and stimulate hypothesis generation.
• Synthesis: Actively challenge and refine the metaphor; let evidence reshape it.
• Communication: Match metaphor to fidelity—avoid “journey” if the reality is a network.
• Reflection: Ask how the metaphor influenced what was gathered and what was ignored.
Conclusion
As my personal reflection, I’ve come to see metaphors as scaffolding: essential during construction, but never part of the finished structure. The “user journey” has been one of my most productive frames — and one of my most constraining. The “inspiration hub” taught me another lesson: even the most innocent internal shorthand can, once externalised, create expectations we never intended.
Holding a metaphor lightly means allowing for the moments when evidence bends the straight path into a loop, fragments into a constellation, or when a “hub” turns out to be a cluster of loosely connected rooms rather than a single, central space. Mill reminds me to resist mistaking the figure for the fact; Lakoff and Johnson remind me why that’s so difficult. Together, they point to the same discipline: let the metaphor frame — but never let it decide.