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Sensemaking Handoffs: Why? How? and When? by Nikhil Sharma A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (Information) in The University of Michigan 2010
Doctoral Committee: Professor George W. Furnas, Co-Chair Professor Michael D. Cohen, Co-Chair Professor Karl E. Weick Professor Judith Spencer Olson, University of California- Irvine Daniel M. Russell, Google
Acknowledgements
I am very grateful for the following: George Furnas without whose support and encouragement this dissertation would have never come to a fruitful completion. The rest of my committee: Michael Cohen, Judy Olson, Karl Weick & Dan Russell for invaluable feedback. Fellow doctoral students, especially: Yan Qu, Emilee Rader & Rick Wash for thoughts and comments. NSF grant IIS-0325347-ITR, Rackham Graduate Student Research Grant & School of Information for financial support School of Information-Computing, especially Mike Doa for computing support Maria Slowiaczek for editorial guidance
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Table of Contents Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................... ii List of Figures................................................................................................................... iv List of Tables ..................................................................................................................... v List of Appendices............................................................................................................ vi Chapter 1 Introduction .................................................................................................... 1 Chapter 2 Sensemaking and Handoffs............................................................................ 8 Chapter 3 A Qualitative Study of Sensemaking Handoffs.......................................... 31 Chapter 4 Exploratory Lab-studies of Handoff Artifacts........................................... 54 Chapter 5 Laboratory Study of Sensemaking Progress and Use of Handoff Artifacts ........................................................................................................................................... 76 Chapter 6 Conclusions and Implications.................................................................... 110 Appendices..................................................................................................................... 120 References...................................................................................................................... 157
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List of Figures 2.1 Learning Loop Model from Russell et al. (1993) ....................................................10 2.2 Sensemaking Handoff Factors ..................................................................................29 4.1 Bookmark usage in each third of the session time for the high and low quality bookmark groups (χ 2(2)=13.91, p
