Task analysis, calculation and approximation: The work of Stuart K. Card, 2007 Bower Laureate in Computer & Cognitive Science for Human-Centered Computing

In the early 1980s there was a large base of well-regarded cognitive theory—explaining human cognition. Additionally, personal technology was increasingly a factor in the workplace, but it was notoriously hard to use, leading to frustration rather than increased satisfaction and productivity [1–3]. In 1974 Stuart Card accompanied Allen Newell from Carnegie Mellon University to Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) to work on the problem of human–computer interaction. Newell returned to CMU, but Card remained to become the founding manager of the User Interface Research group. first major work The Psychology of Human–Computer Interaction, was published in 1983. It was undertaken to address the problems of usability by closing the gap between theory and technology. It did this by providing a methodology for bringing theory to bear on application. The work served as a foundation for research and development in human–computer interaction for the following 15 years.