Think-aloud
Also said as Think-aloud protocol
A playtest in which you ask players to say what they are thinking as they play. It comes from psychology and from usability research, where Clayton Lewis applied it at IBM in the early 1980s.
Footage shows you what a player did but not why. Only their own words show the wrong idea they had in their head, and that is often the thing you can fix.
Say it
“Ask them to keep talking as they play: what they think that thing is, what they are trying to do. If they go quiet, just ask "what are you thinking?" and never answer their questions.”
Not to be confused with survey
A survey asks people afterwards what they remember and think they felt. Thinking aloud catches the belief at the moment it steers what they do.