|
ON
CUE REPRESENTATIVE SAMPLING.
While
being here at SUNY, Tom Stewart teaches me to step down from high abstractions
and to think in empirical terms. While chewing on my breakfast
yesterday and looking at the drawing of prof. David Andersen's "New Fadum
Farm", which I have finished the night before, I found myself to
be as empirical, as I can possibly be. The following account should be
the proof of it. Now look the picture and try to see, if the
story of its making has anything to say about „cue representative sampling“.
A
Case under consideration.
When I look at this finished „great
piece of art“, some questions come back to my mind, which I had to
answer without much overt thinking, while at the process of
drawing it. What might be their sequence, looking back?
The first step was to decide
about the „static structure“ or composition of what the picture should
be about, some cut of reality, well known „framing of a problem“. Proportions
of objects, their mutual spatial relations. The figure and background.
This I have done just by a gentle pencil lines and in addition, took written
notes about the Step 2 on the actual place itself, at beautiful David’s
home. And then I ran out of time and had to leave. All the rest of
drawing was done later at home. (But be cautioned - when I decided
upon the place and topic, which might be called „Step zero“, I might implicitly
decided about all the steps which are to follow yet!).
The second step was to decide about
the scale of colors, which will be used . The basic color image, sites
with focuses of most active colors.
The
third step was to decide where the sources of light are to be located ,
which in turn will impact on the brightness of color layout (step
2). The focused light sources. Will there be just one and placed
on the picture? Will there be more of them and some, perhaps, beyond the
picture itself? Which parts of the picture layout - meaning what colors
- will be affected by these sources of light and how?
On this actual picture there are
two sources of light. One is on the picture, around the David’s house,
the small yellow tree in front and „burning“ trees behind. The other is
outside of the picture, coming from the right.
The fourth step was to make a choice
of texture. This, of course, is much predetermined by the technique
used - humble color pastel pencils (used in this case) allow for
something different than real pastels, than water colors or even oil colors.
But even within a given technique, some space is always left for the author
to show his/her personal „handwriting“. On this actual picture the texture
is rather bursting out, excited, „wooly“. Substituting for robustness,
which is not much possible to achieve with pencils and fits better my own
nature.
Now
consequences - colors, lights and texture (their contrasts)
may support three dimensional perspective (if there is any) of the
static composition, but their main role is to build just the opposite
quality - the dynamic impact of the whole thing. Also, the way they
are handled results into the degree, in which the outcome is very much
subjective interpretation, deviating from reality, or the outcome is close,
let us say, to photography.
All
of this is a process taking place while working, not always very much conscious
- however, the sequence of steps is fixed. The technological process
of gradual picture building depends much on technique chosen and
there is no need to go into it in our context. Some aspects should be mentioned,
however. Decision making regarding the mutual fit (or discrepancy)
between figure and background is a strong moment - it leads to dramatic
effects or calmness. In the case of David’s „New Fadum Farm“ I went for
a dramatic impact. The sky (background) is rather of a night appearance
as contrasted to day-bright lights and colors of the figure (David’s household
and nearby trees). The night sky (as is my experience) is there usually
full of action - stars mingle with planes, approaching the Albany airport.
The outside source of light reflects something as always lit
nearby railroad station, from where huge freight-trains storm their way
up the slope , passing by David’s home, to romantic horizons of distant
Chicago or Canada. Thus I got two sources of light in one picture
and as a result of that, two stories in one pictures. A night-life
impressions of the countryside and the gleaming household and the golden
tree in front of it The household „emits“ light, it lives and the
golden tree adds to the mysterious feeling. This of, course, is not very
natural and represents a deviation from normal appearance of things in
the nature. This dramatic effect plus the night sky, living its own
life, were my intended goals. Also, the texture of the sky, reminding a
sheep wool (which is much of what the life at „The New Fadum“ is
about) was also on my mind - a second deviation from reality. As far as
I know, it is very rare to have a sky consisting out of sheep wool.
Consequences
for the representative cue samples.
When people explain to each other
their common problems, like in the judgment and decision/making analysis,
problems usually are of much more abstract nature that a piece of landscape.
Try to do a painting of a strategic goal of the organization, a organizational
culture and you will see. All problems, though, take a place within a certain
situation or „ a problem setting“. There are people involved
in them together with their activities, visions, intents, subjective biases
of a real world interpretations. Now, when they try to solve a problem
(within the SJT procedures), they offer sets of cognitive cues. The role
of the cues is to provide as complete information to the other guy as possible.
Usually people proceed from obvious cues to marginal and then try to reduce
them to manageable number. My suggestion is, that in order to make
the final cue set as representative as possible, the group discussion mediator
(judgment analysis expert) should proceed as I did, while drawing „The
New Fadum Farm“. Keeping the scenario of the above mentioned steps in mind,
it should assure a representative result, regardless of its actual
content.
When
the boundaries of the problem are discussed, understood and set (framing
effect), some cues do reflect the static structure of the problem (usual
problem decomposition phase). They must allow to see what is the
figure and what is the background. Try to imagine what form they could
take and you will find , that cues taking care of the structural aspect
of the task will usually invoke analytical cognition (as Hammond’s cognitive
continuum theory suggests). Note, that we just have passed Steps
Zero and Step 1!
How
to proceed along Steps 2 to 4? In the case of a picture drawing as well
as a task within SJT, we are usually limited only to visual cues.
How to obtain cues, which relate the dynamic aspect of a given problem
(task system)? How are scales of color, light sources, texture (so
important for conveying emotions) , contrasts of figure and background
and all intended and unintended subjective distortions (which express aims
and goals) transformed into the social judgment theory language?
How to ensure the representative choice of cues? An what is even more important,
how to ensure, that the set of cues will invoke both analytical and
intuitive modes of cognition (as the picture surely does)?
The task systems surely change over time. Do we reflect their changes by
adequate means? The dynamic aspect of a given problem is (as I understand
it) expressed only by cue characteristics. For instance, the proportion
of nonlinear vs. linear cues would be the only cue characteristics which
attempts to express dynamic, hard to grasp quality of a task system. But
I am not much sure even about that. Function forms of cues, however, induce
analytical mode of cognition. The degree of uncertainty speaks
rather about human cognitive systems, but as the cognitive continuum theory
assumes, it perhaps reflects even something about the dynamic nature
of the task system. A high degree of task uncertainty perhaps
really induces intuitive mode of cognition.
Now
emotions. To be sure, the task system does not contain emotions, but the
cognitive system of humans does. Our representation of the task system
needs to contain cues, which address emotional charge, which the problem
(task system) induces in us and let us to express our emotions. If this
is too overstated (but I doubt it, since if the problem solution gets us
really involved, emotions are at play anyway), then at least we need to
induce the intuitive mode of cognition. Since cues are offered usually
by clients (or research subjects), it is a task of the mediator (researcher)
to make sure these cues are not omitted. If included, even intuitive mode
of cognition will be at play and (group) discussions may address
the dynamic and emotional aspects of problem-solving interaction
more adequately,
Now,
even though I am really unable to justify that, but the analogy with
drawing suggests it, I claim, that means, by which dynamics and emotional
impact are expressed are also a factors, which helps us to understand the
context. A loose interpretation of information theory says, that only the
understanding of context gives us a meaning, which we ascribe to impulses
perceived. Only then perceptual impulses turn into a real information,
which is processed judgmentally. (As you remember on the picture, the background
- the sky and the foreground surrounding the figure of a house with trees
- induces more of an intuitive cognition, invokes emotions and moreover,
conveys my own specific interpretation - meaning - to otherwise neutral
David’s household.) This and the previous paragraph talk about
„emotional background“ which cues usually do omit due to their focus on
the „figure“ - task system, problem to be solved.
Conclusion.
This leads me to a conclusion,
that the use of social judgment theory and the theory of cognitive
continuum in applied settings needs to follow Steps 1 to 4 in the
task system layout phase. Brunswik stressed, that the ecology should be
studied in order to break away from the „organismic encapsulation“ of psychologists.
I would add, that we ought to focus on determining the intuition
inducing cues, to break away from the „analytical encapsulation“ of our
studies. Tom Stewart will get me immediate into a corner by a question,
what such cues might be, for God sake, in his study of rentgenologists.
Of course, I will have a hard time. On the other hand, Patrik Juslin
(due to his study of music) will know what I mean and will have already
some answers in his pocket. And then Kenneth Hammond would smile knowingly
and say - guys, this all rally calls for a good task systems theory.
Why don’t you come with one? And all are right. Unless we have such a theory,
the Step 5 is to guess the proportion of intuition invoking cues needed
in each different study to be really „cue representative“. And to make
sure, some are in it.
Lubomir Kostron,
Center for Policy Research
at SUNY, Albany.
Masaryk university,
Czech republic
October 23,1998
|
|