Kate Forbes-Pitt

The thinking process behind the book 'The Assumption of Agency Theory', began in 1991 when I started to train older people how to use computers. I was surprised at how frightened they were of the machines. The ideas grew until I felt I had something useful to say about how and why people treat computers as they do.

I ask questions like 'is it different to deal with a car that talks back to you?' I think it is, and I explain why. Throughout the book I have tried to use everyday examples to which people can relate - buying a coffee, driving a car - to illustrate how we deal with people and machines in everyday life and why we do it in the way we do.

if you're interested in why it seems obvious that the machine on which you're reading this will do what you want when you ask it to, even though you don't know how to program it, then there will certainly be sections of this book you will find interesting.

I now work In Switzerland on how to describe the objects we encounter through 3D gaming. I am really interested in how computers impact our lives, not just at work enabling us to do everything faster, but in all of life. This is what I study and I try, in the writing that I do, to communicate both my enthusiasm for the topic and what I know in an accessible manner.