Redesign Based on Card Sorting: How Universally Applicable are Card Sort Results?

Abstract

Card sort studies can facilitate developers to create an information structure for their website or application. In addition, this human-centered design method provides researchers with insights into the target group’s mental models regarding the information domain under study. In this method, participants sort cards, with excerpts of the website’s or information source’s information on them, into piles or groups. Even though the method lends itself for large numbers of participants, it can be difficult to include sufficient participants in a study to ensure generalizability among large user groups. Especially when the potential user group is heterogeneous, basing the information structure on a limited participant group may not always be valid. In this study, we investigate if card-sort results among one user group (nurses) are comparable to the results of a second (potential) user group (physicians/residents).