Card Sorting Alfred Kobsa University of California, Irvine

Card sorting Each card shows one concept (which come from user studies or directly from designers) Participants are asked to order cards hierarchically and to come up with category names (possibly let them think aloud, to capture their rationales) Performed individually or in a small group. Also over the Internet Variants: Category names are pre-defined (closed set or user-extensible) Freelisting: users produce all card concepts falling under a category Number of cards: maximum Number of studies: start with 5-6, add some more, and stop when there seems convergence in the results. Otherwise add more studies, specifically if there are different user types (no more than 30 total). Software available (with consolidation across participants) E.g., websort.net = OptimalSort Card sorting can be used to understand users’ conceptual models of an interface or information structure

Result: “Dendrogram”