Information Architecture

Owned by Matthew Evert
Last updated: Jul 14, 2020
4 min read

Work in progress

This page is currently undergoing many revisions. Use the information at your own peril.

 

What is Information Architecture?

Information architecture is the practice of deciding how to arrange the parts of something to be understandable. The practice of information architecture facilitates people and organizations to consider their structures and language thoughtfully.

Information architecture (IA) is a science of organizing and structuring content of the websites, web and mobile applications, and social media software.

Information architecture (IA) focuses on organizing, structuring, and labeling content in an effective and sustainable way.  The goal is to help users find information and complete tasks.  To do this, you need to understand how the pieces fit together to create the larger picture, how items relate to each other within the system.

Information architecture (IA) is the structural design of shared information environments; the art and science of organizing and labelling websites, intranets, online communities and software to support usability and findability; and an emerging community of practice focused on bringing principles of design, architecture and information science to the digital landscape.[1] Typically, it involves a model or concept of information that is used and applied to activities which require explicit details of complex information systems. These activities include library systems and database development.

Information architecture is about helping people understand their surroundings and find what they’re looking for, in the real world as well as online. In other words, information architecture is the creation of a structure for a website, application, or other project, that allows us to understand where we are as users, and where the information we want is in relation to our position. Information architecture results in the creation of site maps, hierarchies, categorizations, navigation, and metadata. When a content strategist begins separating content and dividing it into categories, she is practicing information architecture. When a designer sketches a top level menu to help users understand where they are on a site, he is also practicing information architecture.

 

 

If you’ve ever tried to use something and thought, “where am I supposed to go next?” or “this doesn’t make any sense,” you are encountering an issue with an information architecture.

 

Information Architectures Are All Around Us

Information architectures (IAs) are in the websites we use, the apps and software we download, the printed materials we encounter, and even the physical places we spend time in. 

A good IA helps people to understand their surroundings and find what they’re looking for – in the real world as well as online. Practicing information architecture involves facilitating the people and organizations we work with to consider their structures and language thoughtfully.

We like to say that if you’re making things for others, you’re practicing information architecture.

Information Architecture Forms A Foundation for User Experience Design

Many people are curious how IA is related to user experience (UX) design. UX designers practice IA everyday; the two are closely connected. Put simply, IA is an important skill within UX and other disciplines, such as content strategy, technical writing, library science and interaction design. 

Our mission at the Information Architecture Institute is to get the word out about this important practice, so more people have the words for this work and can therefore better educate themselves and others on it. 

 

 

Here are some of the questions we ask when doing information architecture:

  • What is the flow of users through our site?

  • How does the application help the user catalog their information?

  • How is that information presented back to the user?

  • Is that information helping the customer, and driving decisions?

To answer these questions, the information architect must focus on a number of things: the target audience, the technologies related to the website, and the data that will be presented through the website.

 

 

 

 

Principles of IA

  • Information Ecology (32, IA)

    • Three components: Users, Content, Context

  • Search Types (44, IA)

    • Known item, exploratory seeking, exhaustive research, refinding

  • Information Seeking Behaviors (46, IA)

    • User methods for finding: searching, browsing, asking

    • Two aspects to seeking behavior: integration and iteration

    • Two models of seeking: berry-picking, and pearl-growing

  • Learning About Needs (49, IA)

    • Many research methods, but two primary examples are: search analytics, and contextual inquiry

  • Physical vs. Information Environment (58, IA)

    • An information environment should be reflective of the place it corresponds to (a physical bank vs. an online bank)

  • Modularity & Extensibility (67, IA)

  • Organization Systems (Ch 6, IA)

    • Organizing information is becoming increasingly difficult, originally librarians solely had the charge to organize information, but as everything is proliferated digitally, everyone becomes librarians (98, IA)

    • Heterogeny vs. homogeny (100, IA) (different things together versus same things together)

    • Use research and analysis methods to gain insight on how users group information, what labels, how they navigate (102, IA)

    • Organizing systems are composed of organization schemes, and organization structures (103, IA)

      • Schemes: defines the shared characteristics of content items and influences the logical grouping of those items

        • I.e. how things are organized (food in aisles at a grocery store) (104, IA)

        • Dictionary uses exact scheme

        • Grocery store uses ambiguous scheme

        • Examples of Exact schemes:

          • Alphabetical

          • Chronological

          • Geographical

        • Examples of Ambiguous schemes:

          • Topical Organization (newspaper)

          • Task-Oriented (Microsoft Word)

          • Audience-Specific (CERN: Students, Scientists)

          • Metaphor-Driven (Desktop: folders, files, trash)

          • Hybrid 

      • Structures: defines the types of relationships between content items and groups

        • Hierarchies - Top-Down Approach (117, IA)

          • Things should exist once, if they are repeated, they are considered polyhierarchical (118, IA)

          • Breadth and Depth

            • Breadth: refers to number of options at each level

            • Depth: refers to number of levels in the hierarchy

        • Database Model - Bottom-Up Approach (122, IA)

        • Hypertext (126, IA)

        • Free-tagging: aka folksonomies - hash-tagging like on Twitter, user generated (128, IA)

  • Labeling Systems (Ch 9, IA)

    • Types of Labels (140, IA)

      • Contextual links

      • Headings

      • Navigation system choices

      • Index terms

  • Navigation Systems (Ch 7, IA)

  • Search Systems (Ch 8, IA)

  • Thesauri, Controlled Vocabularies, and Metadata

 

Terms

  • Labels - names given to things (ebay: “seller”, “buyer”)



Research

Strategy

Design and Documentation

 

Taxonomies

 

Resources

References