Analyzing audiences for software manuals: A survey of instructional needs for “real world tasks”

Barbara Mirel Illinois Institute of Technology

Abstract

In analyzing audiences for software manuals, documentation developers need to move past a strictly cognitive vision of users' needs and examine the social and organizational factors that influence task performance and instructional needs. In order to discover the ways in which social and organizational factors affect users' tasks and their acquisition of knowledge and skills, I conducted a survey of 25 people who use databases at work. All survey respondents use database programs as tools for conducting job tasks that involve complex analyses and reporting of data. I examined the relationship between people's technical proficiency and task complexity and their job roles, professional responsibilities, flexibility in work arrangements and modes of workplace learning. Findings show that learning to use databases for complex tasks in work contexts entails more than merely learning concepts and procedures for executing program functions. Users need to learn ways of manipulating a program, integrating and combining its functions in inventive ways to serve the purposes of various types of job tasks and to support professional approaches to these tasks.

Journal
Technical Communication Quarterly
Published
1992-01-01
DOI
10.1080/10572259209359489
CompPile
Search in CompPile ↗
Open Access
Closed
Topics
Export

Citation Context

Cited by in this index (4)

  1. Technical Communication Quarterly
  2. Technical Communication Quarterly
  3. Journal of Business and Technical Communication
  4. Technical Communication Quarterly

References (37) · 4 in this index

  1. Acquisition of Cognitive Skill.
    Office of Naval Research. Technical Report 81–1.
  2. Modelling Cognition.
  3. 10.1145/2135.2136
  4. Functional Approaches to Writing Research Perspectives.
  5. 10.1016/0010-0285(80)90003-1
Show all 37 →
  1. 10.1207/s15327051hci0203_3
  2. 10.1145/48529.48531
  3. Effective Documentation: What We Have Learned from Research.
  4. User‐Centered System Design.
  5. Man‐Computer Interaction: Human Factors Aspects of Computers and People.
  6. Written Communication
  7. The Society of Text: Hypertext, Hypermedia, and the Social Construction of Information
  8. Computing and People.
  9. 10.1016/S0020-7373(87)80064-0
  10. Written Communication
  11. 10.1145/97426.97990
  12. The Acquisition of Procedures from Text: A Production‐System Analysis of Transfer of Training.
    Office of Naval Research. Technical Report 16.
  13. 10.1016/S0020-7373(85)80045-6
  14. 10.1145/63342.63347
  15. Management Measures in End User Computing.
  16. 10.1017/CBO9780511609268
  17. Man‐Computer Interaction Research.
  18. Technical Communication
  19. User‐Centered System Design.
  20. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication
  21. 10.1016/S0020-7373(85)80035-3
  22. The Technical Writing Teacher
  23. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication
  24. Human Factors and Interactive Computer Systems.
  25. Educating the Reflective Practitioner.
  26. Desiging Computer Documentation: A Review of the Relevant Literature.
    Communications Design Center. Technical Report 31.
  27. Simpson, Mark. “How Usability Testing Can Aid the Development of Online Documentation.”. Proceedings of SIGDO…
  28. 10.1080/01638538809544691
  29. Plans and Situated Actions: The Problems of Human‐Machine Communication.
  30. A Descriptive Study of the Behavior of New Users of Unicos Man Pages.
  31. Cognitive Ergonomics and Human‐Computer Interactions.
  32. In the Age of the Smart Machine: The Future of Work and Power