A study of the graphical mediating representations used by collaborating authors

Abstract

Abstract Though they have access to sophisticated authoring support systems, many authors use conventional media for the earliest stages of generating and organising ideas. This paper gives an overview of a study of six pairs of collaborating authors who were videoed in aprewriting task and who also underwent a structured post-interview concerning their use of external representations in the study and in their everyday work. Pairs were studied so that the behaviour was more externalised, there were natural verbal protocols and these protocols could be interpreted by the interlocutor rather than by the researcher. The analysis focuses on the part that the mediating representations play in the cognitive task and in coordinating cooperative cognition. The properties of the marks produced and the affordances of conventional media are considered. The study is interpreted within a ‘shared cognitive’ framework which draws on insights from distributed cognition, socially shared cognition, situated action and most importantly from Soviet psychology. It is suggested that the mediating representations perform two important and highly related functions. First, they support ‘idea sketching’ which is a form of reflexive communication where the individual mediates her own creative cognition through external representations. Second, they mediate cooperative cognition, providing the common grounding necessary to coordinate shared thought.