This research is motivated by the proposition that the tremendous successes of computers in supporting individual decision making can be repeated for distributed decision making. If this comes to pas, the positive implications for organization effectiveness are likely to be as significant and far reaching as those already witnessed for individual productivity. What is needed first is a theory of how organizations represent and process knowledge. This project involves the formulation and linguistic formalization of such a theory. The theory aims to embody constructs and principles that can serve as a basis for describing, studying, designing, testing and managing human/computer distributed decision making systems from a knowledge oriented perspective. Development of the theory necessarily draws on and integrated related research in organization science, Computer science, and decision science. Efficacy of the theory and language is tested on an experimental basis. Specific research topics addressed within the prioritized research plan include the treatment of decision instigation, goal-drive and goal- less processing, inter-role design, event-triggered processing, concurrent problem processing, servers, entity constitution, learning from experience, human interfaces, and participant coordination.
