Cognitive Artifacts in Complex Work - Ambient Intelligence for Scientific Discovery - page 155

from the case study in its investigation of culture [20], and engages multiple
data collection methods to study behavior within the group context. Within
occupational cultures such as acute care or life sciences, we find certain shared
uses and meanings for artifacts, revealing why these artifacts are employed in
joint work, and suggesting limits to adoption of information technology.
Cognitive ethnography [10, 1], has been specifically developed to understand
cognitive work using an ethnographic research approach. Cognitive ethnography
integrates observation, interview, and interaction study toward rich descriptions
and ecologically valid representations of cognitive phenomena in the work set-
ting. Although researchers employ a collection of techniques in this approach,
the research setting, questions, domain, and participant activities determine the
selection of techniques to study distributed nature of cognition and activity.
While individual behavior is studied, the approach focuses “on the material and
social means of the construction of action and meaning.” [10]. Multiple research
methods were employed to gather field data and analyze findings.
The likelihood of obtaining ecologically valid data was improved by triangu-
lation (using multiple methods to account for subject behavior). Drawing from
ethnography, observations followed the participant's natural course of work prac-
tice. Cognitive artifacts were analyzed to identify how information was used and
exchanged. Other methods were used in both studies to examine issues of spe-
cific interest. The acute care study used laboratory style observation of schedule
writing to understand how coordinators plan staff assignments. The life sciences
study used information task diaries with faculty and graduate students, to gather
detailed information behaviors on a daily basis for up to 10 response days over
a 3-week period. Semi-structured interviews and information task walkthroughs
were used to gather additional contextual data. We describe the integration and
interpretation of these data with the case study.

2.2 Cognitive Artifacts as a Tool for Work and Research

Cognitive artifacts are physical objects such as a calendar, a shopping list, or a
computer that humans make to aid, enhance, or improve cognition [13]. Norman
[26] expands cognitive artifacts beyond physical objects to include any artificial
device that displays information, including computer systems, heuristic rules of
thumb, and mnemonics. Kaptelinin [17] makes the distinction that cognitive ar-
tifacts rightly extend to collective use and that they serve not only to improve
whole system performance. They are instruments that improve and change cog-
nition.
We further distinguish between two types of artifacts. What we might call
endogenous cognitive artifacts are made by users to make their own work bet-
ter or easier. Exogenous artifacts are developed outside of the workplace and
installed for use there. We describe endogenous artifacts, which are created and
implemented by their users, and show how they can be used to articulate the
nature and boundaries of (exogenous) information systems. Users maintain these
objects in spite of “leading edge” technology being available. This is not due to
legacy work routines, but because they support distributed cognitive work better.