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| Criterion |  UX Research Diary Study |  UX Research Card Sorting |  Decision Making Assumption Surfacing |  Decision Making Pre-Mortem |
|---|---|---|---|---|
Purposedifferent | When experiences build up over days or weeks and a single session cannot capture them, Diary Study records the course of everyday life. Recurring triggers, moods, and habits become visible this way, beyond the sharpness of memory. | When content only makes sense internally and users can't find the structure again, card sorting exposes their mental order. Terms, groups, and naming are then aligned with the target group's expectations. | Plans often contain assumptions that were never openly stated and remain dangerous precisely because of that. Assumption Surfacing makes these silent premises visible and prioritizes which of them carry the initiative or could sink it. | In early initiatives with many uncertainties, planning quickly turns too optimistic. A pre-mortem makes the expected failure visible in advance and sharpens the view of causes, gaps, and countermeasures. |
Complexitydifferent | Medium | Low | Low | Low |
Timedifferent | 1-4 Wochen | 20-45 min | 45-90 min | 20–45 min |
Participantsdifferent | 5-20 | Based on research question | 2-8 | Small cross-functional group |
Formatdifferent | Async | Workshop + async | Workshop + async | Workshop |
Outputdifferent | Diary Entries, Longitudinal Patterns, Experience Timeline | Content groups, Label set, IA hypotheses | Assumption List, Critical Assumptions, Learning Plan | Risk list, Mitigation plan, Assumption log |
Tagsno overlap | UX researchTrackingBehavior | Information architectureNavigationStructure | AssumptionsRiskDecisionDiscovery | RiskDecisionFailurePlanning |