What Science Actually Says About Card Decks

I sell card decks, so I would love to tell you that science has proved they work.

It has not.

I went looking for that proof last month. Roy and Warren had already done the hard part. In 2019, they reviewed 155 card decks created for designers. Almost none had been properly tested.

Most evaluations asked people whether they enjoyed using the deck. They usually did. Enjoyment is useful, especially when you are trying to get a tired group involved. It still leaves a bigger question unanswered: did the deck help them think more clearly or make better decisions?

One of the rare controlled comparisons put a design deck against ordinary directed brainstorming. The deck did not help people produce ideas faster. Participants simply preferred using it.

That stung for a day.

Then I realised I had been asking the wrong question.

Two decks can create completely different experiences

Imagine two card decks on a table.

The first deck contains 40 useful pieces of advice. You pick up the first card, read it, then move to the next one. By the end, you have read all 40.

The second deck looks almost identical. Each card has a question on the front and an answer on the back. You pick up one card and read the question. Then you stop and try to answer from memory. Only then do you turn it over.

Both decks contain information. Both are printed on rectangles of cardboard. The experience is completely different.

The first deck asks you to read. The second makes you produce an answer before you see the correct one.

Science has plenty to say about those actions.

That changed how I look at decks. I now pay less attention to the object and more attention to the instructions built into it. What happens after someone picks up a card? Do they choose something? Do they move it? Do they give it to another person? Do they have to explain their answer?

Those small actions are what I call play patterns.

A question on the front can turn a card into a memory test

Let us go back to the card with a question on the front and the answer on the back.

Before you turn it over, you have to search your memory. Maybe you know the answer immediately. Maybe you struggle for ten seconds. Maybe you make a guess and feel unsure.

Researchers call it retrieval practice. Instead of putting the information into your head again, you practise pulling it back out.

Roediger and Karpicke tested this in 2006. Students read a short text and then studied it in different ways. One week later, students who had practised recalling the text remembered 61 percent. Students who had spent their time re-reading remembered 40 percent.

The card itself deserves no credit for that result. The card designer can still create the same useful moment by placing the answer out of sight and asking people to make a real attempt before checking.

The timing is important. If people turn the card over immediately, they skip the memory search. I need to tell them what to do: say the answer aloud or write it down. Then they can flip.

Now the front and back of the card have a purpose.

Face-down cards can stop the first answer from taking over

Imagine that I ask six people to estimate how long a project will take.

If the first person says “two weeks,” everyone else hears that number before giving their own estimate. Their answers may drift toward two weeks, even when they had something very different in mind.

This is anchoring. Tversky and Kahneman demonstrated how strong it can be in 1974. People were influenced by a number produced by a wheel of fortune, even though the wheel had nothing to do with the question they were answering.

A deck can change the order of events.

Give each person a set of numbered cards. Ask everyone to choose in private and place one card face down. When all six people are ready, they reveal their cards together.

Nobody hears the first estimate because there is no first estimate. This is the basic idea behind Planning Poker.

The method still depends on how the group uses it. Someone can reveal a card too early. Another person can change their choice after spotting a colleague’s number. Research on real teams has found that these loose reveals can bring the anchoring problem straight back.

So the useful part is precise: choose privately, wait for everyone, then reveal together. The deck makes that sequence easier to run.

A random card gives a stuck group somewhere new to begin

Picture a group trying to name a new service. They have been circling the same safe words for twenty minutes.

Now place a stack of unrelated word cards on the table. Someone draws “bridge.” The group has to connect that word to the service. Maybe they start talking about linking two departments, crossing a difficult gap, supporting weight, or helping customers reach the other side.

The word “bridge” may lead nowhere. That is fine. They can draw another card.

Random prompts have been part of creative-thinking practice for decades. Research in creative cognition suggests that unexpected input can push people away from familiar associations (Finke, Ward and Smith, 1992). The evidence here is less direct than the evidence for retrieval practice, so I treat random cards as a useful way to change the starting point. I do not promise that every draw will produce a brilliant idea.

A digital randomiser could do the same job. The useful move is the unexpected prompt and the effort to connect it to the problem.

Reading a deck can feel like learning

Re-reading has a nasty trick. The material starts to feel familiar, and familiarity feels like knowledge.

Imagine flipping through a deck you have seen several times. You recognise every title. Nothing surprises you. By the final card, you feel as though you know the deck well.

Then somebody takes the cards away and asks you to explain the ideas. Much less comes back than you expected.

Researchers call this an illusion of mastery. Dunlosky and his colleagues reviewed common learning techniques in 2013 and found repeated reading to be a weak strategy for long-term learning.

This matters because a content-heavy deck makes re-reading very easy. The reader can move from card to card without making a decision or producing an answer.

A small change can create more effort. Ask the reader to predict what is on the next card. Give them examples to sort before showing the categories. Ask them to choose one card and explain it to somebody else. Ask them to write a missing card for the deck.

Each instruction changes the role of the reader.

The engagement ladder gives me a useful design check

Chi and Wylie describe four levels of engagement in their ICAP framework: passive, active, constructive, and interactive.

Here is how I translate those levels when I design cards:

• Passive: I read a card.
• Active: I sort cards into piles.
• Constructive: I write a new card in my own words.
• Interactive: I give a card to someone and explain why I chose it.

The framework comes from learning research. It was not created to evaluate commercial card decks. I use it as a practical check because it forces me to look at the participant’s behaviour.

If my instructions only ask people to read, I know exactly where the deck sits. If they ask people to create an answer or discuss a choice, the experience becomes more demanding.

A meta-analysis by Freeman and his colleagues reached a related conclusion in 2014. Across 225 studies in science and engineering education, active learning improved student performance compared with traditional lecturing. Again, those studies did not test card decks. They give me a reason to design participation instead of assuming that attractive content will hold attention by itself.

I still like physical cards

I enjoy watching a group work with cards on a table. People point at them, pass them around, write on them, and push them into new arrangements. The conversation becomes visible.

Lucero and his colleagues studied how designers use cards through observation and interviews. Their work describes why cards can support creative collaboration. It does not tell us whether a paper deck produces better results than the same activity on a screen.

I have not found a controlled comparison that settles that question.

This leaves me free to choose the format that suits the situation. Physical cards are useful when people are standing around a table and need to rearrange ideas together. Digital cards are useful when the group is remote or the deck needs to change often.

The format matters. The action still matters more to my design process.

What I am comfortable claiming

I make and sell decks, so I want to be careful with the promises I make.

I cannot honestly say that card decks have been proved more effective than other formats. I cannot give you a percentage improvement in creativity caused by printed cards. I cannot claim that adding a game-like format automatically creates engagement. I cannot promise that paper cards will beat a digital version.

I can say something more specific.

A question on the front and an answer on the back can support retrieval practice when people attempt an answer before flipping. A simultaneous reveal can protect independent estimates from the first number spoken aloud. A sorting task can make people compare options and commit to categories. A random card can give a stuck group an unfamiliar starting point.

Those claims are smaller. They are also much more useful when I am deciding what to print on the next card.

I design the move before I design the card

I used to begin with content. What information belongs in the deck? How many cards do I need? What should each card say?

Now I begin with a sentence:

When someone picks up this card, they will...

Recall an answer. Make a choice. Place the card somewhere. Give it to another person. Explain it. Combine it with another card. Turn it over at the same time as everyone else.

Once the action is clear, I can design the card around it.

If the sentence ends with “read it,” I keep working.

Sources

• Roy, R., & Warren, J. P. (2019). Card-based design tools: A review and analysis of 155 card decks for designers and designing. Design Studies, 63, 125–154.
• Roediger, H. L., & Karpicke, J. D. (2006). Test-enhanced learning: Taking memory tests improves long-term retention. Psychological Science, 17(3), 249–255.
• Karpicke, J. D., & Roediger, H. L. (2008). The critical importance of retrieval for learning. Science, 319(5865), 966–968.
• Tversky, A., & Kahneman, D. (1974). Judgment under uncertainty: Heuristics and biases. Science, 185(4157), 1124–1131.
• Haugen, N. C. (2006). An empirical study of using Planning Poker for user story estimation. Proceedings of AGILE 2006.
• Finke, R. A., Ward, T. B., & Smith, S. M. (1992). Creative Cognition. MIT Press.
• Chi, M. T. H., & Wylie, R. (2014). The ICAP framework: Linking cognitive engagement to active learning outcomes. Educational Psychologist, 49(4), 219–243.
• Freeman, S., et al. (2014). Active learning increases student performance in science, engineering, and mathematics. PNAS, 111(23), 8410–8415.
• Dunlosky, J., et al. (2013). Improving students' learning with effective learning techniques. Psychological Science in the Public Interest, 14(1), 4–58.
• Lucero, A., Dalsgaard, P., Halskov, K., & Buur, J. (2016). Designing with cards. In Collaboration in Creative Design (pp. 75–95). Springer.