games design 2 - lecture 9.5 - card sorting
DESCRIPTION
TRANSCRIPT
Categorising Data
• If you are working on a game with a lot of data, it may be useful to consider how users would group this data.
• Card Sorting is a methodology which enables non-expert end-users to help categorise items in a way which is useful for interface an user experience design.
Card Sorting
• Generates an overall structure to data.
• Can be used to get suggestions for:– Navigation– Menus– Taxonomies
• Helps bridge the gap between designer mindset and audience mindset.
Card Sorting
• How do users want information grouped?
• How similar / different are the needs of different user groups?
• How many potential categories are there?
• What should these groups be called?
Card Sorting
• Open sorting– Often used early on in process– Users can define their own categories– Can also repeat the task dependent on a criteria
of their choosing
• Closed sorting– Used later in process– Categories are pre-defined
Card Sorts Analysis
• Category/Criteria names– verbatim agreement– gist agreement
• super-ordinate grouping
• Groupings– cluster analysis, tree diagram, co-occurrence
matrices
• Number of criteria/categories
Songs I know/don't know
Familiarity with
Songs that I know
Familiarity with song
Recognised
Example superordinate grouping
Super-ordinate grouping performed by an Independent Judge“Your task is to interpret the criteria into super-ordinate constructs. You should try to identify where the criterion given by one respondent could be said to have meant the same as another but simply have chosen different wording.”
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12
1 85 50 119 169 150 110 151 60 92 151 65
2 115 102 104 87 119 118 129 167 63 134
3 58 80 61 79 97 181 132 61 174
4 114 104 121 147 52 116 89 65
5 112 130 176 108 109 94 92
6 127 95 49 97 155 76
7 123 76 136 98 93
8 100 131 81 83
9 116 75 146
10 61 126
11 79
12
Co-occurrence matrix
Card Sorting Advantages
• Simple
• Cheap
• Quick to Execute
• Established
• User Centric
• Good Foundation for data
Card Sorting Disadvantages
• Emphasizes data over actions
• Possible to have divergent results
• Analysis can be time consuming– Especially if little consensus between
participants
• May capture ‘surface’ characteristics only– i.e. ignoring how the data would be used
Further reading• http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/card_sorting_a_definitive_guide
• http://www.boxesandarrows.com/view/analyzing_card_sort_results_with_a_spreadsheet_template
• http://www.cs.keele.ac.uk/km/blog/?p=10
• http://delicious.com/eddequincey/Card_Sorts
• http://homepages.ius.edu/rwisman/n341/html/CardSorting.htm