Designing an ecosystem
of solutions

4

rounds of concept testing

30+

concept testing interviews

1

round of usability testing

36

card sorting sessions

more engaging
more accessible
More understandable

In order for DPI to achieve justice through education, we propose a learning journey strategy that takes people through a transformation of investment and knowledge.

By adopting a learning journey, DPI ensures anyone that visits their site, comes out a little bit more knowledgeable or invested in the death penalty in the US.

This strategy includes having content that is engaging so that new learners continue learning more, and making it easier for experts to share their knowledge because they play a key role in helping these new learners become invested.

People on death row are not so different from you

The research that informed this design
From our research we found that in order for people to be engaged to learn more, they need to have a reason to care. From our concept testing 70% of participants didn't initially see a reason to engage them with Death Penalty Information, and struggled to find a reason. (Click here to see more of what drives people to learn more).

We found concepts that helped users develop a personal connection to the death penalty was the most effective in giving them a reason to learn more (Click here to see the reasons people need to learn more). So using persuasive design techniques, we created the “People on Death Row are not so different from you” learning experience, that helps people relate the death penalty to them.

Chatbot

The research that informed this design
In order to solve the problem of sharing content tailored to an audience, we created a DPI Expert Chatbot. This generative AI chatbot allows DPI users to share content in multiple different formats, like a summary, visualizations or social media post and tailor it to their audience.

When testing this we found that despite all our participants finding the chatbot helpful, they didn’t interact with the chatbot on their own. However, after interacting with it they saw the value in using it. This caused us to veer away from a typical chatbot design, and add calls to actions highlighting the chatbot’s capabilities throughout the website where relevant to encourage users to use it (click here to see more on the usability of the chatbot)

Research Annotation Tool

The research that informed this design
To streamline the research experts do to create their own content, we created a research annotation tool. This helps experts gather information and create compelling, succinct pieces of content to share with their audience.

All experts from our testing were excited about this concept and found it extremely useful, as many of them do a lot of research on the DPI site (click here to see more on the desirability of the research annotation tool).

Experience more of our learning tools here!

What is IA?

Information architecture is the structure in which the pages are categorized, grouped, and nested within the navigation of the site. It also includes taxonomy and naming conventions for sections, page headers, and tags.

Why IA?

A well-organized and intuitive information architecture helps users navigate the site without feeling overwhelmed. It allows users to interact with the website effectively without needing extra assistance. By improving information architecture, DPI staff can better keep track of where pages live, and users can find what they need confidently and independently.

Our redesigned IA improves findability

36

card sorting sessions

12

responses to category naming

1

new central navigation for all content

After conducting an open card sort completed by new learners, we came up with the following categories:

Our final IA categories

Key issues
“Key Issues” includes existing policy issues that DPI wants to highlight. This includes pages like “Race”, “Mental Illness”, and “Legal Misconduct”. All links should be to section overview pages that highlight one of these topics.

Law & Process
“Law & Process” is divided into the following subcategories:
“Process” - Anything regarding the legal process around the death penalty.
“By Location” - Anything that focuses on geographical differences.
“Alternatives” - Anything about alternatives to a death sentence.

Data & Resources
“Data & Resources” is divided into the following subcategories:
“Data” - Any database, census, or numbers heavy pages
“Resources” - Any reports, analysis, or other documents created by DPI

Learn
“Learn” includes any educational material that is focused on engaging new learners on the site. This includes the learning center, learning modules, interactive experiences, and high school and college curriculum pages.

People
“People” is divided into the following subcategories:
“People” - Any pages that focus on a specific demographic or group experience.
“Opinions” - Any pieces that explore new perspectives, or specific arguments.
“Stories” - Any content that deep dives into individual people’s experiences.

About
“About” includes any information about who DPI is including mission, staff and board, and other features that highlight DPI’s achievements.

What is content strategy?

The practice of creating, managing, and presenting content. This involves anything from structuring content on different pages to how content should be written to match branding guidelines.
Read more about it here.

What is content modeling?

Content modeling is a process that organizes and structures content. This involves understanding what content is needed, how it represents itself on the page in relation to other pieces of content, and what type of content is needed in established content structures.
Read more about it here.

What is a style/tone/voice guide?

A guide that provides rules for what language companies should use. These rules can be about specific tone of voice to even specific wording. This can help define and communicate a brand’s personality, values, and goals.
Read more about it here.

We designed several content models for DPI

5

different content models

2

rounds of iterations on content models

1

style, tone and voice guide

We created templates for DPI to look at for reference when creating these specific page types and provided an example filled out template to show how this might be presented on the website.

‍Based on our concept testing with 12 participants,
‍
- 25% more participants had a clear stance, and
- 40% more participants could provide factual supporting evidence after using our content models.
‍
(See more from our content model testing here).

This is an example of one of our content models: the home page.
In addition, we made edits to our models based on previous testing. For example, 9/12 people in previous concept testing ignored the sidebar on an article page (shown below on the left).

This led us to update the article page to be a single column (shown below on the right), including related articles in the middle of the content instead of on the sides.
Lastly, sometimes DPI uses certain legal terms like “exonerated” because they are needed for people to best understand the death penalty. However, we know from research that new learners often don’t know this word. Because of this, we would recommend specific capabilities like a hover over feature that provides easy to understand definitions in our guide and content models. This is an example of how our style, tone, voice guide will be presented on the website.

The guide will include an outline of important things for DPI to consider in their content’s voice of tone, as well as branding guidelines. We filled in examples of how these sections could look. However, because we are not experts in DPI’s branding and content strategy, we also provided instructions on how DPI staff should continue to use and iterate on the guide.
‍
Click here to see the style, tone and voice guide.
MHCI @ CMU
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300 South Craig St, Pittsburgh PA