A Survey of Intelligence Analysts' Perceptions of Analytic Tools

Abstract

This article presents a survey of 278 intelligence analysts' views of fully operational analytic technologies and their newly developed replacements. It was found that usability was an important concept in analysts' reasons for and against using analytic tools. The perceived usability of a tool was not necessarily indicative of its perceived usefulness. Analysts' decisions to recommend an analytic tool to others were best predicted by how usable analysts perceived the tool to be rather than how useful they considered the tool to be. These findings have implications for the development and implementation of new analytic technologies in the intelligence community.