{
  "schema": "vedokrok.public-item.v1",
  "release_id": "MHC-RPUB-20260920-75ad787a",
  "url": "/knowledge/let-users-group-the-content-before-naming-the-categories",
  "id": "MHC-D-RESEARCH-1093",
  "version": "0.1.0",
  "title": "Let users group the content before naming the categories",
  "summary": "The organisation chart is not the reader’s map.",
  "kind": "protocol",
  "body": "In an open card sort, participants group representative content and name the groups. Ask what belongs together and why. Use recurring patterns and disagreements to propose structures; do not turn one person’s arrangement into universal taxonomy.",
  "limits": [
    "Similarity judgements are not navigation success. Mixed audiences may need more than one route to the same content."
  ],
  "topics": [
    "product-discovery-50"
  ],
  "intents": [],
  "source_ids": [
    "RS-CA8F830846B90092"
  ],
  "evidence": [
    {
      "claim": "Open card sorting asks participants to group content and name their groups.",
      "source_id": "RS-CA8F830846B90092",
      "role": "supports",
      "note": "Preferred groupings do not prove that users can find an item in a finished menu.",
      "locator": "Open card sorting definition."
    }
  ],
  "use_when": [
    "Your category names reflect the project’s history more than readers’ needs."
  ],
  "avoid_when": [
    "Similarity judgements are not navigation success. Mixed audiences may need more than one route to the same content."
  ],
  "example": "Readers place an exercise about asking for clarification beside communication skills rather than grammar theory. That is a categorisation hypothesis worth testing.",
  "check": "Can you explain which user grouping evidence led to each proposed category?",
  "steps": [
    "Prepare understandable content labels without embedding your preferred categories.",
    "Let participants group and name them, including uncertain or overlapping items.",
    "Compare the rationales, draft a hierarchy and test whether people can find real items in it."
  ],
  "sources": [
    {
      "id": "RS-CA8F830846B90092",
      "title": "Card Sorting: Uncover Users’ Mental Models",
      "url": "https://www.nngroup.com/articles/card-sorting-definition/"
    }
  ],
  "relations": [],
  "collections": [
    {
      "id": "RC-B54B60261508AF85",
      "title": "Find the user problem before building more machinery",
      "url": "/collections/find-the-user-problem-before-building-more-machinery"
    }
  ]
}