Here's a helpful glossary of UX research terms (we are constantly adding and improving). If you have suggestions of topics that would be helpful for other researchers, both in and out of the UX field, let us know!

Unmoderated/Moderated:

• Participants = people who are giving feedback. They can also sometimes be referred to as "testers" PlaybookUX has a participant panel where you can select your target demographic or you can use your own participants for a study if you have a list of your own customers or users who you’d like to get feedback from.
• Session = A session is one unmoderated video of a participant going through your website, mobile app etc.
• Study or Project = A study also known as a project is all the sessions combined
• Test asset = what you are looking to get feedback on. It can be a prototype, website, mobile app, youtube video, blog post, marketing email, facebook ad among other things.
• Moderator = someone who is responsible for interviewing the participant. The moderator will ask the participants questions and is responsible for controlling the session

Card Sorting:

• Cards = A card is an individual line item that a participant is sorting into a specific category. For example, a card could include pictures, phrases, or names like "Jacket," "Apple," "Headphones," etc.
• Categories = A category is the group that a participant organizes cards within. For example, a category could be defined as "Produce," "Self Care and Health," "Electronics," etc.
• Open Card Sort = With an open card sort, participants sort a list of items into groups that make sense to them. Participants are free to assign whatever names they want to the groups they’ve created.
• Closed Card Sort = With a closed card sort, participants sort a cards into categories that the researcher predefines. Participants cannot update category names or add additional categories.
• Hybrid Card Sort = A hybrid card sort is where you provide your participants predefined categories, similar to close card sort, but you also allow them to create their own categories if they don’t find a good fit from the predefined categories.
• Merged Matrix = A merged matrix is an analytical view of how frequently participants sorted cards into certain categories. The matrix is set up like a grid, with the cards listed on the left going down and the categories listed going across the top. You can choose to view the data as a frequency (count of participants who chose that category for that card) or percentage. The matrix is color-coded so you can visually see where participants were most frequently sorting cards. The darker the box the more people put the card into that category.
• Similarity Matrix = A similarity matrix is an analytical view of the correlations between cards. If participants frequently grouped 2 cards together in the same category, this matrix will show a higher correlation between the two (indicated by their place on the table and the darker color). The farther cards are away from each other indicates that they are least alike according to the participants.
• Dendrograms = A dendrogram is an analytical view of the similarities between cards. Much like the similarity matrix, this graph shows cards that were frequently grouped together using lines and trees. The closer the line is to the y-axis, the closer the cards are to being grouped together. This graph is color-coordinated to show similar items, and can incorporate more than 2 cards together (for example, if you had a category of "Clothing" and 3 cards that were sorted into it by every participant: "Jacket," "Earrings," and "Shirt," these would all be color-coated the same and organized in the dendrogram with a line between them)

Tree Testing:

• Tree = A tree is the overall structure of navigation you are asking the participants to navigate through during a tree test.
• Nodes = Nodes are the different categories that you are organizing in your tree test structure. Nodes can be placed under specific categories to make subcategories.