1. Rob Gleasure R.Gleasure@ucc.ie www.robgleasure.com
IS3320 Developing and Using Management Information Systems Lecture 13: Practical process-modelling
Rob Gleasure

2. IS3320 Today’s lecture The psychology of process modelling
Conscious and unconscious process
Process modelling by conversation
Process modelling by observation
Process modelling breakdown

3. The psychology of process-modelling
Two of the core concepts we have discussed throughout the course are
Human-centrism
We’re designing systems to address problems faced by people
Activity-based, rather than feature-based, design
We’re addressing problematic behaviours and designing new alternatives – we’re not designing static qualities
Put differently, we’re designing for functions first, then form (not the other way around)
Each of these are complicated demands

4. Designing for human-centrism: a dual-process view of human beings
People are broadly made up of two complementary (and sometimes competing) systems for cognition (how they think)
These are conscious process (thoughts of which we’re aware) and unconscious process (thoughts of which we are not aware)
Sometimes referred to as System 2 and System 1 (Kahneman, 2011) or the C-system and X-system (Lieberman et al., 2002)

5. Conscious processes vs. unconscious processes
Can be rational, verbalised
Limited capacity for parallel thinking
Subject to reflection
Slow
Unconscious processes
Emotional and reflexive
Tied to perceptual systems, hence run effectively in parallel
Fast
Prone to systematic biases

6. Permanent illusions

7. Some thought exercises
How many objects in the room can you think about at a time?
How do you know which object(s) to think about next?
Have you ever been playing a sport or performing some complex activity and got muddled up because you started thinking about what you were doing?

8. Some thought exercises
A video to show the challenges of conscious attention

9. Tacit vs. explicit knowledge/process
In the 1950s, people began to realise that not all knowledge could be externalised (described)
Idea of tacit knowledge
We have a limited symbolic vocabulary
Not everything we do is conscious
Many types of knowledge-sharing are only possible by experience within a specific context
Early argument that tacit knowledge can’t be converted into explicit knowledge

10. Tacit vs. explicit knowledge/process
In general, tacit knowledge forms in two ways
An initially conscious task becomes effortless
Think of writing – do you remember how much concentration was required when you first learned?
Things are learned through non-reflective experience
Could you explain the process to someone how you recognise faces?

11. Hidden vs. conscious influences
From Gleasure and O’Riordan (2016)

12. Process modelling by conversation
Useful for
Listing key explicit processes
Fleshing out explicit processes
Understanding how a person sees their role
Helping people to reflect on their processes
Challenging contingencies
Probing the rationale for processes
Linking processes that affect multiple actors
Documenting and standardising key behaviours
Key: speaking to large numbers of individuals with different roles

13. Process modelling by observation
Useful for
Discovering tacit processes that went unreported because they have become routinized
Processes that actors forgot they were doing
Processes that were assumed to be ‘obvious’
Contextualising and enriching descriptions of explicit processes
Highlighting ambiguities
Identifying sensitive processes
Observing visible interplay with system
Key: immersion and contact in live settings (requires trust)

14. Process modelling by breakdown
Useful for
Discovering invisible tacit processes that actors did not realise were happening
Processes that actors learned reflexively in context
Processes that actors perform due to natural limitations
Discovering the role (or absence of role) for specific system components

15. Process modelling by breakdown
Can occur naturally
Live breakdowns or ex-post analysis
Prone to rationalisation
Can be done systematically
Identify individual feature or information sources and ask actor to describe its role
Remove specific feature(s)/source(s), then ask actor to perform task and score their confidence they have performed it well
Re-insert feature(s)/source(s) and ask actor to perform similar task
Ask them to score their confidence and explain impact of re-introduction of feature(s)/source(s)

16. Want to read more?
Polanyi, M. (1966). The Tacit Dimension. University of Chicago Press, USA.
Lieberman, M. D., Gaunt, R., Gilbert, D. T., & Trope, Y. (2002). Reflection and reflexion: A social cognitive neuroscience approach to attributional inference. Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 34,
Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. Macmillan, UK.
Gleasure, R., & O’Riordan, S. (2016). Exploring hidden influences on users’ decision-making: A feature-lesioning technique to assist design thinking. Journal of Decision Systems, 25(4), 1-17.