What's Your Underlying World View?--
Philisophically, technical writers fall into two epistemological camps (hey! it's my blog; I can use words like that if I want): Positivism and Constructivism.

Positivists
Positivists view reality as singular and rigid: An apprehendable reality is assumed to exist, driven by immutable natural laws and mechanisms. Knowledge of the way things are is conventionally summarized in the form of time- and context-free generalizations. (Guba and Lincoln 1994, p. 109)

Positivist technical communicators tend to define a product by a finite set of features and functions. An accurate and complete cataloging and description of the features and functions will render an accurate and complete description of the product.

Positivists view the relationship between the knower and the thing known as dualistic: There is a distinct separation between the knower and the known. They view reality as being objective: Facts are true or false. They view the role of the technical communicator as being an unbiased describer of a product's functionality.

Constructivists
Constructivists view reality as pluralistic: Reality is expressible in a variety of symbol and language systems. They also see it as plastic: Reality is stretched and shaped to fit purposeful acts of intentional human agents. (Schwandt 1994, p. 125)

Constructivist technical communicators define a product by how people interact with it. No description can ever be complete or totally accurate since the permutations of possible user contexts are too complex.

Constructivists view the relationship between the knower and the thing known as transactional: Meanings are created, negotiated, sustained, and modified within a specific context of human action. The means or process by which the inquirer arrives at this kind of interpretation of human action (as well as the ends or aim of the process) is called Verstehen (understanding). (Schwandt 1994, p. 120).

They also see it as subjective: Facts are deemed viable or not viable within a community of practice.

Constructivist technical communicators interpret product functionality in light of both the user contexts and the developers intentions.

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Whereas we take many of our disciplines and values in technical communication from our positivist past, the future of user assistance lies in a constructivist vision .
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Guba, E. G., and Y. S. Lincoln. 1994. Competing paradigms
in qualitative research. In Handbook of qualitative
research, ed. N. K. Denzin and Y. S. Lincoln. Thousand
Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.


Schwandt, T. A. 1994. Constructivist, interpretivist
approaches to human inquiry. In Handbook of qualitative
research, ed. N. K. Denzin and Y. S. Lincoln. Thousand
Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.