Extracting expertise from experts: Methods for knowledge acquisition

Knowledge acquisition is the biggest bottleneck in the development of expert systems. Fortunately, the process of translating expert knowledge to a form suitable for expert system development can benefit from methods developed by cognitive science to reveal human knowledge structures. There are two classes of these investigative methods, direct and indirect. We provide reviews, criteria for use, and literature sources for all principal methods. Direct methods discussed are: interviews, questionnaires, observation of task performance, protocol analysis, interruption analysis, closed curves, and inferential flow analysis. Indirect methods include: multidimensional scaling, hierarchical clustering, general weighted networks, ordered trees, and repertory grid analysis.Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/73498/1/j.1468-0394.1987.tb00139.x.pd

The Experience of being a Qualified Female BME Clinical Psychologist in a National Health Service: An Interpretative Phenomenological and Repertory Grid Analysis

This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Journal of Constructivist Psychology on 7 April 2017, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10720537.2017.1304301. The Accepted Manuscript is under embargo. Embargo end date: 7 April 2018.This study explores the lived experience of black and minority ethnic (BME) clinical psychologists employed in the U.K. National Health Service (NHS). A mixed method qualitative approach was employed using repertory grids and interpretative phenomenological analysis. Six female BME clinical psychologists took part. Four master themes emerged from the analysis, including standing out as different, negotiating cultural and professional values, sitting with uncertainty, and feeling proud to be a clinical psychologist. The repertory grid analysis supported these findings and enriched the study. Implications of the study are discussed—namely, the importance of the profession increasing the cultural competency and sensitivity of its members as well as becoming more diverse.Peer reviewe

Assessing the value dimensions of outsourced maintenance services

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to investigate the diverse nature of tangible and intangible value dimensions that contribute to customers' perception of value from outsourced maintenance services. Design/methodology/approach - A multiple case study approach has been adopted. Repertory grid, an in-depth structured interviewing technique, has been used in order to draw out the respondents' hidden constructs in evaluating outsourced maintenance services. Data have been collected from four customer organizations of outsourced maintenance services, and a total of 33 interviews have been undertaken. Findings - The paper has identified a range of tangible and intangible value dimensions that are of importance in maintenance outsourcing decision making. The most important value dimensions for maintenance outsourcing were found to be specialist knowledge, accessibility (of the service provider), relational dynamic, range of products and services, delivery, pricing and locality. Although the paper has identified the most important value dimensions the paper also emphasizes the need to take into account the full range of value dimensions in order to understand the whole value pattern in an organization. Practical implications - The results will be of use for maintenance service providers to help them to improve value-adding capacity of maintenance services. The results can also be applied by customers to help them assess the value they receive from outsourced maintenance services. Originality/value - A different perspective on maintenance outsourcing value is provided. The value patterns in different organizations and the viewpoints of respondents in different organizational roles are described. The dynamic nature of these tangible or intangible values over time and their interrelationships has also been explored

Self-esteem, anxiety and assertiveness : a theoretical and empirical approach to the effects of assertion training : submitted as part of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts (Clinical Psychology)

This study was conducted as a tentative investigation of the effect of Assertiveness Training on "normal to pre-clinical" outpatients attending a small psychological clinic. A full evaluation using an acceptable research design had been planned, however particular difficulties arose to obstruct this aim. Employing data from the subjects who had already been tested, further modifications of the major testing instruments (the Gambrill and Richey [1975] Assertion Inventory and Kelly's [1955] Role Construct Repertory Grid) were made as part of the present study. Since an extensive literature survey had indicated that structured theoretical or empirical reports are dwarfed by "popular" publications in the Assertion Training area, it was decided to use the data obtained through further testing to produce a theoretical paper based on the quasi- evaluation that remained. Three levels of subjects, two being sub-samples of the major sample, were put forward to structure the data analysis which then proceeded in three stages to test five basic hypotheses. Comparative and correlational procedures were used in Stages I and II to examine the data firstly on 110 and then on 50 sets of pre-tests. Subjects at Stage III (N = 36) belonged to two training groups and a waiting-list control group. At this level, the experimenter was interested to ascertain whether or not there were significant changes between pre and post-test in subjects' scores on three main variables (Self-Esteem, Discomfort/Interpersonal Anxiety, and Response Probability) . Such changes were found but only for subjects in the training groups and, in particular, the Discomfort variable appeared to take an important part in this preliminary "training effect". Whereas self-esteem and response probability ratings remained relatively consistent on average across the short testing interval, anxiety/discomfort levels decreased significantly among the trainees. This pointed to the benefit of AT as an anxiety-reducing procedure and stimulated comments on the importance of client/patient-oriented diagnostic and therapeutic media. In brief, the results provided some interesting catalysts for theoretical integration and, in addition, a discussion of the testing instruments and their prospects for future use supplied a functional approach to round off the study

Towards a classification framework for social machines

The state of the art in human interaction with computational systems blurs the line between computations performed by machine logic and algorithms, and those that result from input by humans, arising from their own psychological processes and life experience. Current socio-technical systems, known as ‘social machines’ exploit the large-scale interaction of humans with machines. Interactions that are motivated by numerous goals and purposes including financial gain, charitable aid, and simply for fun. In this paper we explore the landscape of social machines, both past and present, with the aim of defining an initial classificatory framework. Through a number of knowledge elicitation and refinement exercises we have identified the polyarchical relationship between infrastructure, social machines, and large-scale social initiatives. Our initial framework describes classification constructs in the areas of contributions, participants, and motivation. We present an initial characterization of some of the most popular social machines, as demonstration of the use of the identified constructs. We believe that it is important to undertake an analysis of the behaviour and phenomenology of social machines, and of their growth and evolution over time. Our future work will seek to elicit additional opinions, classifications and validation from a wider audience, to produce a comprehensive framework for the description, analysis and comparison of social machines

Pedestrian Amenity: On Street Survey Design

Any new road, road improvement or traffic management scheme could affect pedestrian journeys in its locality or elsewhere. Some journeys may be affected directly, with severance caused where the new road or road improvement cuts across a pedestrian route, others may be affected indirectly with a new road causing changes in traffic levels elsewhere. To enable effects on pedestrians to be given proper weight when decisions are taken, techniques are required that forecast the effects of the scheme on the number and quality of pedestrian journeys. This is particularly true in urban areas, since effects on pedestrians may be one of the main benefits or disbenefits of measures to relieve urban traffic. (Continues..

Search Interfaces for Mathematicians

Access to mathematical knowledge has changed dramatically in recent years, therefore changing mathematical search practices. Our aim with this study is to scrutinize professional mathematicians' search behavior. With this understanding we want to be able to reason why mathematicians use which tool for what search problem in what phase of the search process. To gain these insights we conducted 24 repertory grid interviews with mathematically inclined people (ranging from senior professional mathematicians to non-mathematicians). From the interview data we elicited patterns for the user group "mathematicians" that can be applied when understanding design issues or creating new designs for mathematical search interfaces.Comment: conference article "CICM'14: International Conference on Computer Mathematics 2014", DML-Track: Digital Math Libraries 17 page

Pedestrian Amenity: On Street Survey Design

Any new road, road improvement or traffic management scheme could affect pedestrian journeys in its locality or elsewhere. Some journeys may be affected directly, with severance caused where the new road or road improvement cuts across a pedestrian route, others may be affected indirectly with a new road causing changes in traffic levels elsewhere. To enable effects on pedestrians to be given proper weight when decisions are taken, techniques are required that forecast the effects of the scheme on the number and quality of pedestrian journeys. This is particularly true in urban areas, since effects on pedestrians may be one of the main benefits or disbenefits of measures to relieve urban traffic. (Continues..

Construing the cultural other and the self: A Personal Construct analysis of English and Italian perceptions of national character

How we perceive other cultures is arguably of increasing importance in contemporary society, impacting on realms such as international relations, business and tourism. The qualitative research reported in this paper was carried out in the UK and in Italy and adopted a Personal Construct Psychology approach. It aimed to explore intercultural perceptions in a sample of people who had some degree of experience with the ‘other’ culture, and a unique feature of the research is that it asked how those perceptions might be affected if people from both cultures are given access to each other’s perceptions. There was considerable commonality in the perceptions of the English and Italian participants, and each culture envied some of the qualities of the other. However, they initially struggled to accommodate how they were seen by the other and endeavoured to resolve difference by construing at a more superordinate level. The findings also suggest that national identity is rooted in the construing of others’ constructions, achieved through relationship and comparison