The argumentational texture of transaction cost economics

Transaction Costs;Deconstruction Method;economic theory

Using protocol analysis to explore the creative requirements engineering process

Protocol analysis is an empirical method applied by researchers in cognitive psychology and behavioural analysis. Protocol analysis can be used to collect, document and analyse thought processes by an individual problem solver. In general, research subjects are asked to think aloud when performing a given task. Their verbal reports are transcribed and represent a sequence of their thoughts and cognitive activities. These verbal reports are analysed to identify relevant segments of cognitive behaviours by the research subjects. The analysis results may be cross-examined (or validated through retrospective interviews with the research subjects). This paper offers a critical analysis of this research method, its approaches to data collection and analysis, strengths and limitations, and discusses its use in information systems research. The aim is to explore the use of protocol analysis in studying the creative requirements engineering process.<br /

Instructional strategies and tactics for the design of introductory computer programming courses in high school

This article offers an examination of instructional strategies and tactics for the design of introductory computer programming courses in high school. We distinguish the Expert, Spiral and Reading approach as groups of instructional strategies that mainly differ in their general design plan to control students' processing load. In order, they emphasize topdown program design, incremental learning, and program modification and amplification. In contrast, tactics are specific design plans that prescribe methods to reach desired learning outcomes under given circumstances. Based on ACT* (Anderson, 1983) and relevant research, we distinguish between declarative and procedural instruction and present six tactics which can be used both to design courses and to evaluate strategies. Three tactics for declarative instruction involve concrete computer models, programming plans and design diagrams; three tactics for procedural instruction involve worked-out examples, practice of basic cognitive skills and task variation. In our evaluation of groups of instructional strategies, the Reading approach has been found to be superior to the Expert and Spiral approaches

Experts and Decision Making: First Steps Towards a Unifying Theory of Decision Making in Novices, Intermediates and Experts

Expertise research shows quite ambiguous results on the abilities of experts in judgment and decision making (JDM) classic models cannot account for. This problem becomes even more accentuated if different levels of expertise are considered. We argue that parallel constraint satisfaction models (PCS) might be a useful base to understand the processes underlying expert JDM and the hitherto existing, differentiated results from expertise research. It is outlined how expertise might influence model parameters and mental representations according to PCS. It is discussed how this differential impact of expertise on model parameters relates to empirical results showing quite different courses in the development of expertise; allowing, for example, to predict under which conditions intermediates might outperform experts. Methodological requirements for testing the proposed unifying theory under complex real-world conditions are discussed.Judgment and Decision Making, Expertise, Intermediate Effects, Parallel Constraint Satisfaction, Mental Representation

Chippe : a system for constraint driven behavioral synthesis

This report describes the Chippe system, gives some background previous work and describes several sample design runs of the system. Also presented are the sources of the design tradeoffs used by Chippe, and overview of the internal design model, and experiences using the system

Design: One, but in different forms

This overview paper defends an augmented cognitively oriented generic-design hypothesis: there are both significant similarities between the design activities implemented in different situations and crucial differences between these and other cognitive activities; yet, characteristics of a design situation (related to the design process, the designers, and the artefact) introduce specificities in the corresponding cognitive activities and structures that are used, and in the resulting designs. We thus augment the classical generic-design hypothesis with that of different forms of designing. We review the data available in the cognitive design research literature and propose a series of candidates underlying such forms of design, outlining a number of directions requiring further elaboration

Working Notes from the 1992 AAAI Spring Symposium on Practical Approaches to Scheduling and Planning

The symposium presented issues involved in the development of scheduling systems that can deal with resource and time limitations. To qualify, a system must be implemented and tested to some degree on non-trivial problems (ideally, on real-world problems). However, a system need not be fully deployed to qualify. Systems that schedule actions in terms of metric time constraints typically represent and reason about an external numeric clock or calendar and can be contrasted with those systems that represent time purely symbolically. The following topics are discussed: integrating planning and scheduling; integrating symbolic goals and numerical utilities; managing uncertainty; incremental rescheduling; managing limited computation time; anytime scheduling and planning algorithms, systems; dependency analysis and schedule reuse; management of schedule and plan execution; and incorporation of discrete event techniques