Stories and Computing
We conducted two initial pilot study workshops to investigate participants’ perception of the CHAZOP process and its potential effect on their own writing. As these workshops were relatively small, they are intended to serve only as a proof of concept, with full validation of the CHAZOP process to follow. Both workshops utilised the full range of CHAZOP guidewords, and a minimal set of fictive components (plot, setting, character, voice, theme).
Qualitative and quantitative feedback was sought for both workshops, and both were approved by a relevant ethics committee (anonymised herein).
Both pilot study workshops were carried out at the Crescent Arts Centre in Belfast, using the same experimental process. Participants were recruited using social media advertising, personal outreach by Crescent Arts in accordance with GDPR regulations, and advertisement on the Crescent Arts homepage.
After obtaining consent, participants at both workshops were provided with an overview of the CHAZOP process and a high-level introduction to its aims. All participants had been encouraged to submit a piece of fiction prior to the workshop (either complete or incomplete). These were anonymised and distributed to all participants prior to the workshop so that they could prepare. The pieces submitted across both workshops included completed short story drafts, unfinished short story drafts and excerpts from completed novel drafts.
Participants conducted a CHAZOP process on each of the pieces in turn, facilitated by the researchers at both workshops. Each piece was approximately 5000 words long, and the CHAZOP process lasted approximately one hour for each piece.
Following both of the workshops, participants were asked to complete an anonymous post-study questionnaire, requesting both qualitative and quantitative feedback.
The quantitative feedback for both workshops included the following questions:
The second workshop also included two additional questions:
The qualitative feedback asked the participants to provide their opinion on CHAZOP, and anything else they would like to be taken into account.
As this was a preliminary study, with correspondingly low participant numbers (11 participants across the two workshops), no statistical significance between conditions and questionnaire responses was expected. Nevertheless, there were indicative trends to support our hypothesis that CHAZOP is perceived to be of benefit to novice writers as a workshopping tool. We note that one participant had to withdraw leaving the questionnaire incomplete, so only partial responses are available for some questions.
Participant selection was guided by Crescent Arts Centre. Of the workshop participants, 6 were novice writers, and 5 were either professional writers or pursuing higher education degrees in creative writing. Only 1 participant (10%) had had no experience with creative writing courses or writing workshops before, while all the other participants (90%) had had experience with these either via Crescent Arts or other venues. Of the professional writers, all but one had also had experience with running community workshops aimed at improving students’ writing. This selection was due to constraints around the recruitment and identification of participants, with all participants sourced via their existing connections with Crescent Arts Centre. The gender balance was biased towards female participants, with 64%) female representation.
Participants across both workshops felt strongly that CHAZOP was of benefit when considering both complete pieces of fiction (82% agreement that CHAZOP would be helpful) and incomplete fiction (90% agreement that CHAZOP would be helpful). Amongst novice writers, there was 100% consensus that CHAZOP would be helpful for incomplete fiction. These results are shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1 to go here.
Participants also considered that CHAZOP would present greater benefit to novice writers than experienced writers. Nevertheless, 80% of the professional participants considered that CHAZOPs provided moderate benefit to themselves as experienced or professional writers. Furthermore, all professional participants who ran community workshops aimed at improving students’ writing identified that they were likely to use CHAZOP in their future teaching practice, with the one dissenting participant noting as a qualitative explanation that she did not teach such workshops. These results are shown in Figure 2.
Figure 2 to go here.
Amongst the novice writers, the average score for whether participants considered CHAZOP to be helpful to themselves personally as writers (0 = very unhelpful; 4 = very helpful) was 3.1, while the average score for whether they considered CHAZOP to be helpful to them as a writing group participant workshopping someone else’s writing was 3.7. These results are shown in Figure 3.
Figure 3 to go here.
When asked to rank the five fictive component of CHAZOP, participants identified character (mean value 1.8) and plot (mean value 2.2) as the most useful, with theme being considered least useful (mean value 4.1). These results are shown in Figure 4.
Of the guide words, TOO MUCH was considered the most useful (mean value 1.2) with BEFORE the least useful (mean value 7).
Figure 4 to go here.
Qualitative responses were also sought from the participants via free-text feedback. These were overall very positive, with the following comments recorded on the questionnaire:
We also note that one comment was received from one of the participants, who considered the extension of CHAZOP to a solo exercise for professional writers:
Although no statistically significant conclusions can be drawn, the results demonstrate some promising trends. Firstly, the CHAZOP process was considered by a large majority of the participants to be helpful for both complete and incomplete pieces of writing. The participants also considered CHAZOP to be of most benefit to novice writers, while the majority of professional participants said they were likely to use it in their teaching practice (with the remaining participant caveating her response that she would not use it by noting that she does not teach such workshops). Similarly, a majority of the professional writers identified that CHAZOP was of value to themselves personally, estimating it at a “moderate” benefit. In support of this, the majority of novice writers considered CHAZOP to be of significant benefit both to themselves as writers, and to their techniques and practices as writing workshop group members.
There was also general consensus on the most useful fictive components (plot and character) and the most useful guide words (TOO MUCH, NOT ENOUGH and LESS). Suggestions for additional fictive components have included “linguistic creativity”, “friction” and “structure”, which will be incorporated into future iterations of the workshop.