Dear Terry,

Thanks for your response.

** The literature is not very helpful.
I agree. There are only some books/articles that are relevant to some very specific questions. It’s just an indication that the literature does not reflect ‘practical knowledge of experts’.
[This is fairly fundamental. Donald Schön wrote his PhD thesis on this topic (1955), and the first chapter of ‘The Reflective practitioner’ deals with ‘rigorous professional knowledge based on technical rationality’. It is a question if it is at all possible to base professional decisions on available guidelines.]

** Clinical research does not generate guidelines
You write: "It is clinical research that gives the guidelines for design practice.” 

I think that there is a step in between ‘clinical research’ and ‘guidelines’. In order to get from the results of clinical research to guidelines, it seems essential to compare a substantial number or clinical research results on all sorts of criteria. Based on the comparison and analysis of many clinical studies, it is possible to devise guidelines. This is a research activity, but it is not ‘clinical research’ anymore. I would classify the analysis of different clinical research results as ‘applied research’. Testing the alternative approaches to find ‘best practice’ is part of this. After that, some guidelines might be devised.

** Clinical research starts by asking questions.
You write: “What is needed is clinical research exactly on the specific design practice of interest (in this case, designing double column books to be compact, readable and attractive).”

You seem to suggest that 'clinical research done by others' will help your specific question. For me, that is like going to a doctor and the doctor prescribes medicine that she prescribed earlier for a similar patient. The similarity might be based on looks, or on surname, or on day of the week. There would be no need to do any tests nor to ask any questions. Just a similarity is enough to prescribe a similar medicine?
	This seems to be characteristic for any profession (lawyers, nurses, therapists, …): they always try to figure out first what needs to be done by asking questions and prodding the situation. 

Asking for specific guidelines on ‘double column books’ is like going to a lawyer and asking for a contract on ownership, or to a nurse to inject, or to a therapist to treat. I hope that their reactions will be ‘what kind of ownership: of what?’, ‘what kind of injection: against what?’, or ‘what kind of treatment: for what?’.

The reactions of Gunnar, Mike, and David start by asking questions. ‘A double column book?’. What is it about? and ‘who is it for?' It’s impossible to give clinical advice without considering the situation. It is not a matter of money or time: it is simply essential practice.

Kind regards,
Karel.
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