- It helps the team gain a shared understanding of the findings after each interview
- Reminds the team members of what they noticed while it is still fresh in their minds
- If people tend to take a lot of notes, it is ultimately faster to sort after each session
- Able to summarize results quickly if you plan to make design changes between user tests/interviews

Pros of Sorting After Each Interview/Test Session

- It does take a lot of time, and the same results could possibly be achieved by a quick discussion after each interview
- It can deter stakeholders from coming to the final, post-testing affinity diagramming meeting because they have been coming to all the meetings between tests

Cons of Sorting After Each Interview/Test Session

- For ideation workshops, ideas will often be sorted by the team after they are generated, all within the same workshop
- For organizing research findings, team members can choose to sort the notes after each participant's interview/test session and again after all the sessions are done  

University of Michigan - Ann Arbor

Affinity Diagramming refers to the process of organizing related facts, ideas, or observations into distinct categories.

Affinity Diagramming

https://www.nngroup.com/articles/affinity-diagram/ 

"Affinity Diagramming for Collaboratively Sorting UX Findings and Design Ideas" (Kara Pernice)

- Before the meeting
- Generating sticky notes
- Organizing the sticky notes into groups

Steps in the Affinity Diagramming Process

Variations in the Affinity Diagramming Process

Affinity diagramming is primarily used by teams for organizing:
- Observations or ideas from a research study
- Ideas that surface in design-ideation meetings
- Ideas about UX strategy and vision

Uses of Affinity Diagramming

- Software (CAQDAS)
- Journaling
- Affinity Diagram Techniques 


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Related

Learn After