Towards a codification of practical knowledge

International audienceAs practical knowledge seems to have a central place in organisational issues, we focus on possibilities to study and formalize it. From an unusual theoretical perspective, we view practical knowledge as embodied knowing which only is only manifest through action in a particular situation. Although this knowledge is largely implicit, we try to make what is 'articulable' explicit. After highlighting the stakes involved in the codification of practices, we review the ontological and epistemological assumptions underlying the method developed. It is founded on participant observation, a video recording of a situated subjective perspective and an ex post interview using this perspective to aid an actor to make part of his/her practical knowledge explicit. We present its implementation within research on polar expeditions in order to understand how an experienced actor deals with risks. In conclusion, we point out (1) the importance of this kind of data in knowledge management, (2) some lines of further research

Human Aspects of Information Ergonomics

The need for information within a real-time operational environment, e.g. a trans-portation system, is related to predefined tasks and emerging events as well as the resulting activities and communication processes. Human operators have to per-form such tasks and react to such events taking place in their environment. The

Processes of learning in the recognition of eye-signals

In a learning experiment 10 Ss as receivers judged looking signals of a sender. Providing feedback about the real direction of gaze produced learning in the direction of an improvement of discrimination performance; the improvement was independent of visual acuity of receivers and was not. correlated to extraversion and neuroticism. Performance at the beginning was poorer and learning progress better for fixation points which were further away from the face. Results are discussed with reference to improving accuracy of observers on the variable 'looking behavior', important in studies on nonverbal communication. A pretraining of observers which allows explicit feedback about the real direction of gaze is proposed.In einem Lemexperiment beurteilten 10 Vpn als Empfiinger die Blicksignale einer Person, die als Sender fungierte. Die Diskriminierungsleistung der Empfanger verbesserte sich als Folge von feedback-Informationen. Die verbesserte Leistung war unabhangig von der Sehscharfe und korrelierte nicht mit Extraversion und Neurotizismus. Fur Zielpunkte des Blicks, die weiter vom Gesicht entfemt waren, war die Leistung am Anfang schlechter und die Leistungsverbesserung ausgepragter. Die Ergebnisse werden im Hinblick auf eine gro6ere Genauigkeit bei der Beobachtung der Variablen 'Blick-Verhalten' diskutiert, was fUr Untersuchungen liber non-verbales Verhalten wichtig ist. FUr Beobachter werden Trainings-Programme vorgeschlagen, bei denen RUckmeldungen liber die tatsachliche Blickrichtung des Senders vermittelt werden konnen. Resume Au cours d'une experience sur l'apprentissage, 10 sujets se comportant comme des recepteurs ont juge les signaux du regard d'un envoyeur. En fournissant de la retroaction quant a la vraie direction du regard on a obtenu un apprentissage dans le sens d'une amelioration de la performance discriminatoire: l'amelioration etait independante de l'acuite visuelle des recepteurs et n'6tait pas correlative a l'extraversion ou au caractere nevrose des sujets. Au debut la performance etait plus mediocre et le progres dans l'apprentissage meilleur dans le cas des points de fixation qui etaient les plus eloignes du visage. On discute des resultats en vue d'ameliorer la precision des observateurs sur la variable 'comportement du regard' important dans les etudes sur la communication nonverbale. On propose un entralnement prealable des observateurs, entrainement qui permet une retroaction explicite quant a la vraie direction du regard