ASPECTUAL ANALYSIS

All things are situations and all human activity are multi-aspectual in nature. Aspectual analysis helps us escape from not only the reductionism of focusing on one aspect, but also from the black-and-white thinking that sees nothing other than the opposition between two aspects (for example capitalism-versus-socialism).

See examples of multi-aspectual situation. Dooyeweerd's aspects can account for the complexity of everyday living. But how can we analyse this complexity without diminishing it or overlooking things that are important? This page looks at types of aspectual analysis and ways of expressing the results. There are several things we might wish to do:

• to understand something, in a rich, multi-aspectual way
• to critique something, showing what is good and not so good
• to make suggestions to improve something.

The 'something' might be a concrete situation or thing, or it might be a general thing such as a set of guidelines or a theory. To do these, there are several types of things we can express in terms of aspects.

• what is happening in each aspect in something
• to ensure that all aspects are covered (checklist)
  • to highlight a missing aspect
  • to highlight aspects that are receiving too much attention
• to stimulate discussion about balance or imbalance in attention to aspects
• the different kinds of attention we give to each aspect
• benefits and detriment, good and evil

Examples may be found on the following pages;

• Evaluating Institutions and Movements

1. ASPECTUAL ANALYSIS

Analyse the thing, examining every aspect of it. Use the aspects to guide your thinking about it. Analysis can proceed in three ways:

• 1. Go through each aspect in turn, from quantitative to pistic, asking in what ways the thing expresses this aspect.
• 2. Go through each aspect in turn, in the reverse direction, from pistic to quantitative, asking in what ways the thing expresses this aspect.
• 3. Begin with the most obvious aspects, then proceed to ones that these remind you of, and finally ask about any aspects not yet covered.

However, in practice, one tends to cycle round and come back to others. And even for 1 and 2 you might begin not with the terminal aspects, but one of those near them, e.g. instead of the pistic, you might begin with juridical or ethical.

Which to use, and when?

• 3 is probably the most useful. It is the best one to use when interviewing others, since it begins where they are rather than with an 'aspectual task'.
• 1 and 2 can be useful when you are observing as onlooker.
• 1 can be useful to give others, or even yourself, practice at thinking about aspects, because it begins with 'easy' and 'simpler' aspects and proceeds to the richer ones. Also, since the quantitative, spatial and kinematic aspects of something are unlikely to be particularly important without reference to other aspects, mistakes made in them do not matter much, so they are the good ones to practice on and get yourself or others used to thinking aspectually.
• But, if you are well-versed in aspectual analysis, 2 is better than 1 since it begins with the most meaningful aspects.

However, I think the most useful types of analysis I undertake are not so structured as those. Rather, I find myself sensitive to forgotten or non-obvious or overlooked aspects. For example, the child's playground at Castle Park, Frodsham has a small wooded area one side. Suppose we were to ask mothers why they like the playground. They would probably mention safety, and the range of equipment available. They might also say something general about 'nice surroundings'. But they probably would not mention the wooded area s such. But my intuition tells me that the biotic aspect of the trees is more important than we might expect. This would lead me to ask a specific question to expose this aspect, such as "Suppose that instead of trees there was a concrete wall; would you still come so often?" A leading question, perhaps, but one designed to uncover a specific aspect. I would not ask about the aspect as such, and might not even think about it as an aspect, but I would simply be aware of things that exhibited the overlooked aspect and ask about them.

2. UNDERSTANDING

To understand a thing or situation aspectually, collect statements about each aspect of the thing, and then look at the whole picture. There are various ways of doing this.

2.1 Analysis of texts

This might involve an analysis of text. For example, Mitev [2001] discussed the failure that was the early SNCF (the French national railways) Socrate rail ticketing system:

"Technical malfunctions, political pressure, poor management, unions and user resistance led to an inadequate and to some extent chaotic implementation. Staff training was inadequate and did not prepare salespeople to face tariff inconsistencies and ticketing problems. The user interface was designed using the airlines logic and was not user-friendly. The new ticket proved unacceptable to customers. Public relations failed to prepare the public to such a dramatic change. The inadequate database information on timetable and routes of trains, inaccurate fare information, and unavailability of ticket exchange capabilities caused major problems for the SNCF sales force and customers alike. Impossible reservations on some trains, inappropriate prices and wrong train connections led to large queues of irate customers in all major stations. Booked tickets were for non-existent trains whilst other trains ran empty, railway unions went on strike, and passengers' associations sued SNCF."

Each phrase seems to be of a certain aspect, e.g. "sued SNCF" is juridical. If we collect these, then we can distribute phrases among the aspects as follows:

Table 1. Aspects of Socrate Use

Aspect	Phrases from Mitev's report
Quant'ive	Large, all
Spatial	queues
Kinematic	timetable and routes of trains, wrong train connections
Physical	-
Biotic	-
Psychic	not user-friendly, unacceptable to customers, irate
Analytic	tariff inconsistencies, airlines logic, inadequate database information
Formative	Technical malfunctions, prepare salespeople, Impossible reservations
Lingual	inaccurate fare information, Staff training, Public relations failed, sales force
Social	the public, passenger associations
Economic	poor management, ticket exchange capabilities, customers, non-existent trains, trains ran empty, railway unions went on strike
Aesthetic	chaotic implementation, prepare the public to such a dramatic change
Juridical	political pressure, inadequate implementation, The user interface was designed using the airlines logic, inappropriate prices, Booked tickets, passengers' associations sued SNCF
Ethical	-
Pistic	unions and user resistance

To undertake textual analysis, go through phrase by phrase or even word by word, on the grounds that each phrase or word is often there by deliberate human choice, whether that choice is conscious or not. (If a phrase gets in from sheer habit of using and repeating that phrase, then it is perhaps meaningless, and can be ignored.)

A variant on this is to collect quotations from a variety of sources.

Analysis of text is often a good way to learn and practise aspectual analysis. You need practise before you can undertake direct analysis, which we discuss next. However, once you have become practised, it is usually better to begin with direct analysis and use analysis of texts only afterwards; see below.

2.2 Direct Analysis

An alternative to this is to analyse something directly, rather than using texts. Maybe by observation or by interviewing. This too can provide a number of facts about the thing in each aspect. For example, an analysis of the Elsie expert system yielded:

Table 2. Aspects of Elsie

Aspect	Usage of Elsie
Quant'ive	Number of questions, Number of floors, Magnitude of cost.
Spatial	Shape, size of building, Determine whether building fits site.
Kinematic	Lifts, stairs.
Physical	Ground loadbearing capacity, Finger force on keyboard.
Biotic	Muscle exerts force; light activates retinal cells, Opening windows for fresh air:PsychicUsers feel good about Elsie.
Analytic	Clarify client requirements, Separated building elements, Shapes on screen as significant, e.g. as letters, digits
Formative	Flexibility of layout, functional quality, Developing specification for the building, User formulates answer with computer.
Lingual	Communicate with client, Explanations of questions, User understand the questions and give answers,
Social	Cultural meaning of the questions, Enhance relationship with client., Circulation space.
Economic	Work out how to reduce costs, Final cost, Resources of the UI, e.g. screen area, time waited for computation. Time taken to answer questions.
Aesthetic	Aesthetic-amenity quality, Harmony between surveyor and client., Style of UI.
Juridical	Knowledge of local byelaws, building regs, Does the UI do justice to info, users?, Do justice to client's real needs.
Ethical	Surveyors happy to sacrifice power as experts, A 'generous' UI that gives more than strictly necessary.
Pistic	Role change to partners with shared goal.

Such tables express the multi-aspectual functioning that is the thing or situation. But they can be taken further; see below. However, before that, let us consider a different type of analysis, and also expanding.

2.3 Multi-aspectual Knowledge Elicitation (MAKE)

A rather different method, developed by Mike Winfield, involves looking at concepts that are meaningful in various aspects and linking them together. This can yield an aspect map such as follows:

>

Figure 1. Aspect map generated in Multi-Aspectual Knowledge Elicitation

The steps of the MAKE process may be seen as:

1. Introduction (e.g. explanation of kernel meanings of aspects, and obtain statement of requirements)
2. Identify a few (e.g. a couple) important aspects.
3. Focus on one of these aspects and specify any laws, axioms, data, definitions, and constraints that apply to the domain.
4. Identify as many concepts as possible that lie in this aspect. (Note: May need to check the concepts at a later stage to ensure they fall within the correct aspect.)
5. Apply Low Level Abstraction to each concept, which needs, or is thought to need exploding.
6. Repeat steps 3-6 as necessary.
7. Use the aspectual template to identify any new aspects, which may apply to the concepts specified (build bridges between concepts and aspects), and return to step 3.

Low Level Abstraction was a concept that Winfield developed from the 1991 edition of Clouser [2005] and refers to becoming aware of the various aspectual properties of things yet without isolating them from the things themselves.

2.4 Expanding Aspectual Analysis

• Look for the obvious things you might have overlooked simply because they are so obvious. For example, how many users of Elsie are there above?

• Go over it again, after an interval, and new things will emerge.

• Ask someone else to suggest new things.

• Add in various cultural connotations if these are relevant to understanding the thing or situation. For example, in analysing a situation cardiac arrest, one cultural connotation is that this is a very serious thing.

• Think more deeply. For example, jokes often 'work' because what on a surface reading expresses something appropriate or 'lawful' turns out to be the very thing that is inappropriate. Appropriateness is a juridical issue.

• Undertake textual analysis. Go through phrase by phrase or even word by word, and you will often find the obvious things and many other things you have missed out. And it might help you think more deeply.

2.5 Taking Aspectual Analyses Further

Table 3. Aspects of HCI, ERC and HLC in Elsie

Aspect	HCI of Elsie	ERC in Elsie	Elsie HLC
Quant'ive	Number of questions	Number of floors.	Find out cost of building.
Spatial	Spatial layout of the keys.	Shape, size of building.	Determine whether building fits site.
Kinematic	Movement of fingers to press keys.	Lifts, stairs.	-
Physical	Force on key; light emitted by screen phosphor on retina; elecl-chem activity in brain.	Ground loadbearing capacity.	-
Biotic / Organic	Muscle protoplasm exerts force; retinal cells activate with light.	Fresh air: opening windows.	-
Psychic / Sensitive	Nerve signals from retina/cochlea to brain, to fingers, within brain to recognise and remember patterns.	-	Users feel good about Elsie
Analytic	I distinguish shapes on screen as significant, e.g. as letters, digits, conceptualising and categorizing them.	Separated building elements.	Clarify client requirements.
Formative	User forms letters into words, questions, makes inferences, formulates answers.	Flexibility of layout, functional quality.	Develop specification for the building.
Lingual	I understand the questions and give answers.	Explanations of questions.	Communicate with client.
Social	Cultural meaning of the questions; Standardization of UI.	Circulation space.	Enhance relationship with client.
Economic	Resources of the UI, e.g. screen area, time waited for computation.	Final cost.	Work out how to reduce costs.
Aesthetic	Style of UI.	Aesthetic-amenity quality.	Harmony between surveyor and client.
Juridical	Does the UI do justice to info, users?	Knowledge of local byelaws, building regs.	Do justice to client's real needs.
Ethical	A 'generous' UI that gives more than strictly necessary	-	Surveyors happy to sacrifice power as experts.
Pistic	My vision of who I am as I interact: controller of computer.	-	Role change to partners with shared goal.

Thus, as a result of undertaking aspectual analysis, we were enabled to detect something we might not have known before.

After the entire process of analysis is finished, then you can ask yourself:

• What does this analysis do for me?
• What does this analysis NOT do for me?
• What to do with this now? How to take it further?

Very often the answer is to proceed to critique.

3. CRITIQUE

So far we have sought to understand a thing. But to critique a thing, we need to go further, and interpret it relative to some normative standard.

• Informal or unstructured critique, such as when involved in a discussion, and aware that certain aspects are being over-emphasised while others are ignored.

• Structured critique, such as when contracted to provide consultancy advice or write a report, or when undertaking research.

3.1 Unstructured critique.

Keep a mental note of which aspects the discussion covers. Be aware of which aspects are often overlooked, such as the latest aspects (some of aesthetic to pistic). Be aware of which aspects are often over-emphasised in western culture (economic, formative and analytic) or in anti-western culture (biotic, psychic, social).

How to present this? Can gently suggest which aspects are over- or under-emphasised, usually in terms of something meaningful in those aspects rather than naming the aspect itself. Often by means of a question, e.g. "Are we overlooking issues of justice here?"

3.2 Structured critique - Aspectual Balance.

Interpretation involves applying a normative standard. The aspects provide two normative standards:

• balance: all the aspects should be given due consideration, none over- or under-emphasised
• laws: each aspect is itself normative, defining what is good and what is bad.

Very often, if we ignore an aspect, then we also transgress its laws, so the two are intertwined.

Look at the lists of things in each aspect found during our analysis. Is there a lot more in some aspects than in others? For example, an analysis of Alexander's 'design patterns' shows:

Table 4. Aspectual spread of Alexander's patterns

Each number is a pattern that guides architects in designing a building, and three main things are considered: construction of the building, the building as something in which human life takes place, and the town in which it is situated. Balance can be considered in three parts:

• Notice the long lists against the physical and aesthetic aspects in the Construction column, indicating that perhaps architects might give too much emphasis to these matters. Then the social, sensitive (psychic) and aesthetic aspects are emphasised when Alexander considers buildings.

• Now look for aspects which are missing or with very short lists. For example, ethical has a short or null list in all three columns. And, surprisingly, lingual is also under-represented.

• Now ask: it is reasonable for these aspects to be under- or over-represented? For example, we might expect that when considering construction of a building the physical and formative aspects would deserve more consideration. We find the physical has a long list, but instead of the formative we have a long aesthetic list. That architects tend to be over-concerned with aesthetics explains the long aesthetic list, but why is Alexander so little concerned with formative activity? Think: is it reasonable for the lingual aspect to be so under-represented in all three columns?

In this case we have analysed a set of guidelines, and then it is usually best simply to look at aspectual balance. But when analysing concrete situations, we can take aspectual norms into account.

3.3 Structured Critique - Aspectual Norms

Taking the normativity into account, and differentiating good from bad, is often more useful when analysing concrete situations rather than guidelines. Each aspect has norms. For example, according to the juridical aspect, justice is good, injustice is bad. The norms of the aspects are summarised in the following table.

Table 5. Dysfunction or evil in each aspect

Aspect	Dysfunction
Biotic / Organic	Disease
Psychic / Sensitive	Emotional instability
Analytic	Confusion
Formative	Laziness
Lingual	Lying
Social	Hatred, disrespect
Economic	Waste, squandering
Aesthetic	Boredom, Ugliness
Juridical	Injustice
Ethical	Selfishness, self-centredness
Pistic	Idolatry, disloyalty

An analysis of aspectual normativity of a situation would look at the ways in which the situation exhibits either good or bad in each aspect. Note that this helps us cope with things that exhibit both good an bad characteristics, such as something that is beautiful and yet unjust, or just and yet ugly.

A useful visual device that helps in such normative analysis is known as the aspectual fir tree, in which the amount of positive and negative functioning in each aspect is shown by the length of two bars, negative to left, positive to right:

Figure 2. Fir tree of aspectual repercussions

This (totally fictitious tree) could represent the use of a geographic information system. It shows major benefits in the spatial aspect (obviously!), the analytical (helping us clarify where we are) and the lingual (e.g. helping us communicate our position). But there might be dis-benefits in the ethical aspect (e.g. making the user selfish), pistic (e.g. user tends to focus too much on location and this reduces their loyalty to others), the juridical (... and they overlook the rights of others). Notice how in some aspects there are both benefits and dis-benefits.

But, as a pseudo-numerical device, the aspect tree can give an over-simplified picture if we are not careful. The following guidelines should be noted:

• Never take the length of a bar as some kind of absolute value of aspectual functioning, and never compare two bars of similar length to conclude that functioning in one aspect is 'better' than in another.

• But look at the overall patterns and groups. Often, as in Fig. 4-3, the main positive functioning or benefit lies in the earlier aspects, while the main negative functioning lies in the later ones. This should give cause for concern because the impact in the earlier aspects is likely to be more visible and to accrue in the short-term while the detrimental impact in the later aspects might become manifest only over the long term. This gives a false impression of the 'success' of a computer project if evaluation is undertaken too soon.

• Then look at the longer bars. Do they truly indicate major repercussions or functionings, or do they indicate undue attention to these aspects during analysis? Make a specific study of these aspects, to determine which it is.

• Look likewise at the short or zero bars. Were these aspects overlooked during analysis? Make a specific study to check, then redraw the tree.

• Remember that everybody's understanding of the aspects is variable -- by interviewees, authors and analysts -- even though we all begin from an intuitive grasp of their meaning . So, any further analysis undertaken should include appropriate checks.

In this way, the aspect tree device is not an end in itself so much as a stimulant to focus further analysis, which could be carried out using Winfield's MAKE method, described below.

It can sometimes be useful to separate out aspectual functioning from aspectual repercussions, in two such fir trees side by side. For example, for Mitev's description of the Socrate failure, we can make a simple count of the number of times each aspect is referred to (as expressed by the phrases in the quoted text), either as a functioning or as a repercussion. We obtain the chart illustrated in Figure 4-4.

Figure 3. Aspectual view of Socrate failure

Even though only a single paragraph has been analysed -- and so this picture will be grossly misleading -- several things become clear: that this failure involved negative functioning in many aspects, not just the technical (formative), that the aspects in which the significant negative repercussions occur might not be those in which the negative functioning occurs, and that the most serious repercussions (that Mitev was interested in) were in the juridical aspect. That Mitev was not aware of Dooyeweerd's aspects, but merely adopted a lifeworld stance, is testimony to the power of this approach.

The aspect tree device may be used for both retrospective analysis, as here, or prospective analysis, during design or prediction. It may be a single tree, showing either functioning or repercussions or both together, as in Fig. 4-3, or one in which functioning and repercussions are separated, as in Fig. 4-4.

4. MAKING PROPOSALS FOR IMPROVEMENT

This follows critique. If we know what is wrong, then we can make suggestions for how to correct that - without sacrificing that which is already OK. We can make aspectual suggestions based either on balance or on aspectual normativity.

If we detect imbalance, i.e. an ignored aspect, then the obvious thing is to draw attention to that aspect, and make proposals for giving it due consideration. There are at least three kinds of suggestion we can make (with an example relating to the ethical aspect):

• We can suggest the aspect as such, e.g. "Are we overlooking the ethical aspect here?"
• We can suggest a property or functioning in the aspect, e.g. "Will this lead to greater selfishness among users, or greater generosity?"
• We can suggest things, e.g. "Would it be useful to create guidelines that applaud generosity, and structures which reward it?"

which is appropriate depends on the situation.

5. SOME DANGERS AND DIFFICULTIES

• The obvious one: the need to learn the aspects.

• Phil Rozenberg's 'Halo Effect'. When a company performs well in one factor (e.g. financial), people perceive it doing well at all levels. So if a situation is good in one major aspect, and aspect that the analyst or participant quite likes, then it might be perceived to do well in others.

6. EXAMPLE: GUIDELINES FOR UI

(Extract from 'Philosophical Frameworks for Understanding Information Systems', Basden [2007], IGI Global.)

All aspects have normativity (even the deterministic ones). This normativity offers a basis for establishing sound practical guidelines for developing or evaluating UIs or whole computer systems. The shalom principle of simultaneous realization of norms emphasises the importance of attending to each aspect. While it is appropriate on occasion to focus attention on one aspect (usually the qualifying) we should always do so in a way that gives all the other aspects their due. If we over-emphasise an aspect, and in the extreme absolutize it, we begin to ignore other aspects, and the result is that the success or fruitfulness of our activity is jeopardised. Thus, for example, a web page that has superb graphics but is otherwise devoid of useful content it will fall into disuse.

Web pages are user interfaces, and we can see the normativity of many of the aspects recognised in the more mature published web design guidelines. Table 6 shows the 'Research-Based Web Design and Usability Guidelines' of the National Cancer Institute [2005] and the main aspects of each guideline (aspects indicated by the first letter of their name, from Q = Quantitative to P = Pistic). Many have two aspects, sometimes because they cover two things (e.g. "set goals" (formative) and "state goals" (lingual)) and sometimes because the main idea is of two aspects (e.g. sharing is both lingual and ethical). We do not differentiate between qualifying and founding aspects here, but could do if a more precise analysis were needed.

Table 6. Aspects of Web Design Guidelines

We can use aspectual analysis as a basis for critique. The first thing that strikes us is how many aspects are represented here. This is, of course, what one would expect from a good, mature set of guidelines such as the NCI guidelines are. Second, we might look for imbalance among the aspects. The spatial and formative aspects appear more often than most other aspects; we can ask ourselves whether this is appropriate. Perhaps more significant are some gaps, at least in this 2005 version, some of which are quite surprising:

• The pistic aspect of vision of who we are is completely absent, yet one might expect some mention of the designers' vision for the website. (It is possible that "Set goals" implies some pistic vision for the site.)

• The ethical aspect of self-giving is present only in sharing design ideas. Guidelines on how to give the reader more than is actually due to them, and thus create a site that feels generous, would be useful.

• The juridical aspect is almost absent, only represented tangentially in the concept of providing 'useful' content. The juridical aspect would be relevant in terms of giving both the topic and the readers their due.

• Perhaps most surprising is the almost complete absence of the social aspect -- the two inclusions are rather tangential. Since websites are read by people from any and every cultural group, with varying background knowledge, expectations and world views, we might expect a whole set of guidelines on appropriate use of cultural connotations, humour, idiom, and on respecting cultural sensitivities.

• The kinematic aspect is almost entirely absent. Animation can be used to show movement, but have the designers of these guidelines overlooked this, treating animation as a mere sensitive or aesthetic decoration?

This aspectual analysis of these guidelines is not meant primarily as a criticism of the guidelines, which are excellent when compared with many others that are available, but rather to show how aspectual analysis can be useful as an evaluation tool, and how it might be used to suggest future improvements.

Andrew Basden, 23 November 2007.

All diagrams and tables copyright (c) Andrew Basden, 2007.

This page, "http://dooy.info/using/aspanal.html", is part of a collection that discusses application of Herman Dooyeweerd's ideas, within The Dooyeweerd Pages, which explain, explore and discuss Dooyeweerd's interesting philosophy. Email questions or comments are welcome.

Written on the Amiga and Protext in the style of classic HTML.

You may use this material subject to conditions. Compiled by Andrew Basden.

Created: 23 November 2007 Last updated: 1 December 2007 added some experience from H.I.'s analysis. 8 May 2008 Intuition about overlooked aspects. 16 December 2008 Halo effect, plus new section on dangers. 4 August 2009 links to maf, examples/maspl. 5 May 2020 new intro, new .end, .nav. 23 December 2021 link to eval.inst; canon.