MODELING MULTIPLE AND COLLABORATIVE TASKS

A Special Issue of ACM Transactions on Computer-Human Interaction (TOCHI).

Special issue editors: Hilary Johnson, Jon May, Peter Johnson

Deadline for Submissions: 30 June, 2002.

This is a call for papers which extend task analysis or other modeling approaches to provide systematic understanding of multiple and collaborative activities, and which contribute to the design of technologies to support those activities.

The motivation for this special issue is the need to understand how people work individually, on one or more tasks, and collaboratively in groups. There is also a corresponding need to generate task, individual and collaborative user requirements, to devise design solutions for systems that are usable, and to systematically evaluate those design solutions and systems. Rich and interesting forms of human activity occur across and within a range of complex and varied domains and environments. There are currently two related challenges to be addressed by human computer interaction. The first challenge is to develop principled approaches to describing, modeling and understanding these forms of individual and collaborative human activity. The second challenge is how to provide effective input to the development of computer and software technologies to support multitasking and collaborative work activities.

In the past task analysis has provided one solution to modeling human activity. However, the majority of approaches to analyzing and modeling tasks have concentrated on individual tasks with clearly defined goals and start and end points. There has been much less focus on analyzing and modeling individual or collaborative tasks that are undertaken in parallel or are interleaved. These often occur in dynamically changing environments, and with additional challenges, such as interruptions or the occurrence of continuous activities supported by sophisticated and increasingly mobile technologies. The work can involve teams where membership changes frequently depending on the different roles of the team members and the team as a whole. Technological support for these activities is predominantly a desktop, direct manipulation user interface. This inflicts a style of interaction and a manner of working that constrains users by serializing and trivializing what would otherwise be complex, parallel tasks. There is an overwhelming need to provide better support for these forms of human activity.

On the other hand, much of the progress in collaborative systems has involved the development of technologies to provide functionality assumed to be needed in areas such as access control to, and sharing and distribution of, data and resources. This functionality may also attempt to support "awareness" of people, and/or events (for example, the ability to see and/or hear each other's actions and identities). In addition, ethnographic studies have been undertaken in a variety of situations and domains, focused on activities which are a fundamental part of those domains. The lack of a clear link between these analytical, empirical and ethnographic studies, and the development of supporting technologies, is a potential problem. There is a need for a systematic understanding of how collaborative activities are or could be improved, supported or hindered by such technologies.

We welcome theoretical contributions which address the issues of identifying and understanding the core concepts in multiple and collaborative human activities, and which outline the most important issues to be addressed by current and future approaches to multitasking and collaboration.

We also welcome analytical, empirical and practical contributions which might arise as a result of conducting case studies in multiple and collaborative tasks, where the underlying philosophy, approach to data collection and modeling, and behavior can be generalized to other related human activities.

All contributions will be rigorously peer reviewed to the usual exacting standard of TOCHI. Further information, including TOCHI submission procedures and advice on formatting and preparing your manuscript, can be found at <http://www.acm.org/tochi/>. Please indicate in your cover letter that you are submitting a contribution to the special issue on "Modeling multiple and collaborative tasks". To discuss a possible contribution, please contact one of the following special issue editors:

Hilary Johnson <H.Johnson@bath.ac.uk>
Jon May <jon.may@sheffield.ac.uk>
Peter Johnson <P.Johnson@bath.ac.uk>

The deadline for contributions is 30 June, 2002.

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Last Updated: 7/29/02; 9:30:28 AM