Your smarts shows in how you use a day

No two people spend a day the same way. It turns out, however, that there are striking similarities in how people in various lifestyles use theirs.

The New York Times recently published an interactive graph displaying data from the American Time Use Survey. Some of the patterns may seem obvious, but it’s striking to see the difference education makes on working hours, time spent in leisure, eating and activities such as housework.

The annual survey asks thousands of people to recall every minute of every day. Their accounts, displayed on an hourly basis in the chart, are food for thought when crafting personas or seeking an understanding of your customers’ lifestyles. It’s helpful, as Futurethink says, to consider “they spend their time and what, on average, they’re doing at a particular time during the day.”