| authors |
Vera, A., Kvan, T., West, R. and Lai, S. |
| year |
1998 |
| title |
Expertise, Collaboration and Bandwidth Usability of Groupware |
| source |
Proceedings of ACM CHI 98 Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems 1998 v.1 pp. 503-510 |
| summary |
This paper describes the results of a study evaluating the effects of computer mediation on collaboratively solving architectural design problems. Pairs of graduate design students were asked to work on a landscape architecture design problem via computer terminals. In one condition they were allowed to communicate with an electronic whiteboard and a chat-line while in the other, the chat-line was substituted with video-conferencing (real-time video and audio). The protocols were evaluated according to two models. First, they were coded according to the pattern of collaboration, distinguishing meta-planning, negotiation, evaluation, and individual work. No differences were found between the two groups when coded this way. The protocols were also coded in terms of the problem-solving content, distinguishing task-related exchanges, interface-related exchanges, low-level design exchanges, and high-level design exchanges. The results showed that in the bandwidth-limited chat-line condition, participants cut down task and interface-related as well as low-level design exchanges but attempted to maintain the same amount of high-level design exchanges. When the final designs were evaluated by professional architects, no differences were found between two conditions indicating that chat-line participants implicitly compensate for the narrower bandwidth interface. |
| keywords |
Cognitive Models; Expertise; Collaboration; CSCW |
| series |
other |
| references |
Content-type: text/plain
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| last changed |
2002/07/07 16:01 |
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