Frame Shift Intervention

batch: First Iteration/Batch 32

alias: Reframing for Action

notes: Reconciliation proposes this as an alias or merge candidate into the parent archetype.

alias: Perspective Shift

notes: Common human wording for the same general intervention.

alias: Problem Reframing

notes: Useful when the frame shift begins by restating the problem.

alias: Cognitive Entrenchment Disruption

notes: Names a frequent trigger; keep as collapsed or subtype candidate unless distinct structure is proven.

alias: Frame-of-Reference Shift

notes: Useful when the analogy to observational frame is explicit.

Frame of Reference

role: Primary source prime: changing vantage point changes what is visible, relevant, measurable, or actionable.

Cognitive Entrenchment

role: Explains the stuck condition in which a familiar frame keeps attention locked on old assumptions and solution paths.

Boundary Critique

role: Supports examination of which boundaries, stakeholders, causes, or responsibilities the current frame includes or excludes.

Framing

slug: framing

role: The archetype deliberately changes the interpretation through which evidence, roles, and options are organized.

Representation

slug: representation

role: A frame is a representation that emphasizes some features and suppresses others.

Perspective

slug: perspective

role: Frames are practical viewpoints that shape what a problem looks like from a given position.

Mental Model

role: Entrenched frames often live as assumptions about how the system works.

Metaphor

slug: metaphor

role: Metaphors often carry frame assumptions and can be changed to expose different action paths.

Sensemaking

slug: sensemaking

role: Frame shifting helps people reinterpret ambiguous or conflicting evidence before acting.

Counterfactual Reasoning

role: Alternate frames often ask what would be true if a different cause, role, or boundary were assumed.

Hidden Path and Barrier Crossing

role: A successful frame shift can reveal a path or barrier that the old frame made invisible.

components:
Current Frame
Frame Assumption Map
Frame-Induced Blind Spot
Alternate Frame
Reframing Prompt
Action Translation
Reality Constraint Check
Frame Conflict Register
Stakeholder Meaning Check
Reversion Trigger

essence_one_line: Change the frame of reference so hidden assumptions, constraints, or solution paths become visible.

compression_statement: When a problem appears stuck because the current frame makes some causes, constraints, roles, or options invisible, deliberately introduce a credible alternate frame and translate the new interpretation into action.

core_intuition: A frame is not just language around a problem; it is a working filter that decides what counts as cause, evidence, responsibility, option, and success. Frame shift intervention treats stuckness as partly representational: the next move may require changing the interpretive structure before optimizing within it.

canonical_formula: entrenched_current_frame + frame_induced_blind_spot -> alternate_frame -> changed_assumptions -> action_translation

structural_problem: Actors are trapped in a frame that defines the problem, constraints, causal story, or roles in a way that blocks solution discovery or misdirects action.

condition: A group keeps trying variants of the same solution even though the problem persists.

condition: The current problem statement assigns cause or responsibility so narrowly that other leverage points disappear.

condition: Stakeholders argue past each other because the dominant terms of debate force a false choice or exclude a relevant perspective.

condition: New evidence is repeatedly interpreted as confirmation of an old story instead of prompting a changed hypothesis.

condition: The apparent constraint may be a product of how the problem has been framed rather than a property of the system itself.

symptom: The same causes, villains, solutions, or tradeoffs recur in every discussion.

symptom: People can name what is wrong but cannot imagine a different action path.

symptom: A problem statement contains hidden role assignments, such as user error, compliance failure, management failure, or technical limitation.

symptom: Counterexamples and edge cases are dismissed because they do not fit the prevailing story.

symptom: Local fixes fail because the frame hides upstream constraints, downstream effects, or excluded stakeholders.

root_tension: The existing frame is useful enough to feel legitimate but partial enough to block discovery. The intervention must respect the evidence the old frame captured while loosening the assumptions that made other actions invisible.

case: The decisive issue is choosing the right analytical scale rather than changing the broader interpretive frame; use Scale Reframing.

case: Two complementary frames must be held simultaneously rather than replacing or shifting the operative frame; use Dual-Frame Analysis.

case: The issue is preserving relationships during transformation, not changing interpretation; use Topology-Preserving Transformation.

case: The desired output is only a nicer phrase, slogan, or communications spin without changed assumptions or action.

case: The existing frame is simply false or harmful and should be rejected directly rather than balanced or softened through reframing.

structural_intervention: Make the current frame explicit, identify the blind spots it creates, introduce one or more credible alternate frames, test what each alternate makes newly visible, and translate the resulting insight into a concrete change in decision, design, investigation, or action.

action: Name the current frame

rationale: Surface the working story, boundary, role assignment, causal model, and success criterion currently guiding action.

action: Identify frame-induced blind spots

rationale: Ask what the current frame makes hard to see, hard to value, hard to blame, or hard to try.

action: Select a credible alternate frame

rationale: Choose a frame that reveals a different but plausible structure, not a random slogan or wishful reinterpretation.

action: Map changed assumptions

rationale: Compare how causes, actors, boundaries, constraints, risks, and success criteria change under the alternate frame.

action: Run a constraint and evidence check

rationale: Prevent reframing from erasing facts, harms, obligations, or material limitations.

action: Translate into action

rationale: Convert the frame shift into a design change, decision rule, experiment, governance move, or next investigation.

action: Monitor frame adoption and reversion

rationale: Watch whether people fall back into the old frame and whether the new frame creates new blind spots.

rule: Use this archetype when changing the frame would change the action, not merely the tone of the discussion.

rule: A valid alternate frame must preserve relevant evidence while revealing something decision-relevant that the old frame missed.

rule: Do not use reframing to avoid accountability, deny harm, or make an unacceptable situation sound acceptable.

rule: If two frames both remain necessary, shift to Dual-Frame Analysis rather than forcing one frame to replace the other.

rule: If the new frame changes who is affected or responsible, document that change explicitly before acting.

prose_essence:
Frame Shift Intervention changes the working interpretation of a problem so that hidden assumptions, excluded actors, neglected constraints, or invisible solution paths become available for action. The archetype is not simply “thinking differently.” It is a controlled move from an entrenched current frame to a credible alternate frame, followed by evidence checking and action translation.

The essential pattern is: name the old frame, identify what it hides, introduce a better-fitting alternate frame, test what changes, and act on the new structure without discarding facts that must remain true across frames.

prose_when_to_use:
Use this archetype when a team is stuck inside a problem statement that keeps producing the same causes, villains, tradeoffs, and fixes. It is especially useful when the current frame assigns responsibility too narrowly, treats symptoms as causes, excludes relevant stakeholders, or makes a promising intervention path seem impossible.

It is also useful when new evidence is being forced into an old story. A frame shift can turn “users are careless” into “the interface makes the safe action hard,” “employees resist change” into “the transition design creates avoidable cost,” or “the program has low demand” into “the access path is too burdensome.”

Do not use it as spin. A valid frame shift must preserve relevant evidence, harms, obligations, and material constraints.

prose_structural_problem:
The structural problem is frame lock-in. A current frame organizes evidence, roles, causes, and options so strongly that alternatives become hard to imagine or easy to dismiss. The frame may be partly true, which makes it persuasive, but still incomplete enough to block action.

The stuckness often appears as repeated failed fixes, circular arguments, blame that never leads to repair, or a problem statement that already smuggles in the answer. The intervention treats this as a representation problem before it treats it as an optimization problem.

prose_intervention_logic:
The intervention begins by naming the current frame in concrete terms: what it treats as the cause, who it treats as responsible, what it counts as evidence, what boundary it draws, and what success would look like. Then the team asks what this frame hides or makes difficult to say.

A credible alternate frame is then introduced. It might shift from blame to system design, from compliance to access burden, from individual skill to feedback quality, from conflict to misaligned incentives, or from failure to experiment. The alternate frame is tested against evidence and constraints before it is translated into action.

The final step is operational: the new frame must change a decision, design, experiment, metric, support plan, investigation, or governance rule. If no action changes, the intervention has not yet completed.

prose_key_components:
### Current Frame

The current frame is the operative interpretation already guiding action. It includes the assumed cause, boundary, responsible actors, relevant evidence, and success criterion. Naming it prevents the group from treating its assumptions as neutral reality.

### Frame Assumption Map

The frame assumption map makes implicit commitments visible. It asks what the frame assumes about causes, actors, constraints, values, and responsibility. This map is the comparison surface for any alternate frame.

### Frame-Induced Blind Spot

A frame-induced blind spot is what the current frame hides, devalues, misattributes, or makes unthinkable. This component is central because the archetype is only useful when the blind spot changes the action.

### Alternate Frame

The alternate frame is a credible new vantage point. It may be causal, operational, stakeholder-based, ethical, temporal, spatial, metaphorical, or boundary-based. It should reveal something the old frame missed while preserving facts that remain valid.

### Reframing Prompt

A reframing prompt is the structured question or exercise that induces the shift. Examples include “What if this is a workflow problem rather than a motivation problem?” or “What would this look like from the affected user’s position?” The prompt is a mechanism, but the archetype requires some deliberate reframing move.

### Action Translation

Action translation converts the new interpretation into a concrete next step. It prevents reframing from becoming discussion theater. A completed frame shift changes what the team will do, test, design, monitor, or decide.

### Reality Constraint Check

The reality constraint check ensures the new frame does not erase evidence, material constraints, harm, accountability, or stakeholder claims. It is the main safeguard against denial, manipulation, and cosmetic relabeling.

prose_common_mechanisms:
### Reframing Workshop

A reframing workshop is a facilitated procedure for applying the archetype. It can help a group name the current frame, identify blind spots, generate alternate frames, and choose action translations. The workshop is not the archetype; it is one way to implement it.

### Perspective-Taking Protocol

A perspective-taking protocol shifts participants into another actor’s vantage point. It can reveal burdens, constraints, or meanings that the dominant frame excludes. It implements the archetype when the changed perspective leads to a changed action.

### Role Reversal Exercise

Role reversal temporarily swaps positions or responsibilities. It is useful when participants are over-attached to their own role frame. It must be paired with evidence and decision translation, not treated as empathy performance.

### Problem Restatement Prompt

A problem restatement prompt asks the team to restate the same situation under different assumptions: as a design problem, incentive problem, trust problem, access problem, boundary problem, learning problem, or system problem. This is a lightweight mechanism for finding candidate alternate frames.

### Red-Team Framing Review

A red-team framing review challenges the dominant frame by asking what it omits, who benefits from it, what contrary evidence it dismisses, and what alternate frame better fits the evidence. It works best when the goal is insight, not contrarian performance.

### Outsider Review

Outsider review uses someone less embedded in the current frame to notice assumptions insiders no longer see. It is useful for cognitive entrenchment but needs enough contextual grounding to avoid shallow criticism.

### Metaphor Shift Method

Metaphor shift changes the comparison that organizes the problem. For example, moving from “battle” to “migration” changes implied roles, supports, and risks. This method is powerful because metaphors carry action logic, but it can also drift into rhetoric without evidence checks.

### Coordinate Transformation Analogy

The coordinate transformation analogy borrows from analytical frame-of-reference thinking. It asks which conclusions are artifacts of the current coordinate system and which facts remain stable under another representation.

prose_failure_modes:
A common failure mode is cosmetic reframing: the words change but ownership, incentives, metrics, and action remain the same. Another is denial reframing, where a new frame minimizes real harm or obligation.

Bad alternate frames are also common. A clever interpretation may feel liberating while being unsupported by evidence. Old-frame reversion can occur when participants leave a workshop and return to old metrics, blame language, or routines. Power-blind reframing can shift burden onto less powerful actors by presenting their constraints as attitude problems.

prose_neighbor_distinctions:
**Scale Reframing** is distinct when the decisive shift is analytical level: micro, meso, macro, local, or global. Frame Shift Intervention is broader and may change causal, social, stakeholder, metaphorical, or value frames.

**Dual-Frame Analysis** is distinct when two complementary frames must be preserved together. Frame Shift Intervention usually changes the operative frame to escape a limiting interpretation.

**Boundary Reframing** changes what is inside or outside the system boundary. Frame Shift Intervention may use boundary critique, but it also includes role, cause, metaphor, perspective, and value shifts.

**Hidden Path Discovery** identifies an overlooked route. Frame Shift Intervention may reveal such a route, but the structural intervention is changing the interpretation that hid it.

**Cognitive Reframing** is best treated as a near name or appraisal-focused variant unless review confirms a separate structure.

prose_cross_domain_examples:
In organizational change, a team may stop framing employees as resistant and instead frame the rollout as a workflow-fit and incentive-alignment problem. That shift changes action from persuasion to support, redesign, and feedback.

In product design, “users do not read instructions” can be reframed as an affordance or cognitive-load problem. The action changes from writing more instructions to changing the interface.

In public service delivery, low uptake can be reframed from lack of interest to access burden or trust barrier. The action changes from awareness campaigns to enrollment simplification and outreach redesign.

In software incidents, operator error can be reframed as a system-safety problem involving interface design, observability, escalation, and guardrails.

In education, low performance can be reframed from lack of motivation to missing prerequisites or unclear feedback, creating a different instructional response.

prose_non_examples:
Renaming a harmful action with softer language is not Frame Shift Intervention. It is cosmetic relabeling or manipulation if it does not preserve harm, duty, and accountability.

A brainstorm of metaphors is not the archetype unless one frame is selected, tested, and translated into action. A scale change is Scale Reframing when level of analysis is decisive. Preserving two complementary frames is Dual-Frame Analysis. Ignoring real constraints by calling them a mindset problem is a misuse, not an example.

prose_tradeoffs:
Frame shifting trades stability for generativity. It can unlock new options, but it can also unsettle shared language and challenge expertise. It can create insight, but it can delay action if people keep searching for a better interpretation.

It can also be persuasive in ways that are ethically risky. Because frames influence what people notice and value, a frame shift can become manipulation if it hides harm, accountability, or burden. The reality constraint check and stakeholder meaning check are therefore not optional in sensitive contexts.

prose_invariants_to_preserve:
A frame shift should preserve empirical facts that remain valid across interpretations. It should also preserve material constraints, safety obligations, legal or ethical duties, and legitimate stakeholder claims.

The intervention should preserve traceability: readers should be able to see how the new frame changed the action. It should preserve accountability rather than using reframing to move responsibility away from powerful actors. It should also preserve the decision goal unless changing the goal is itself an explicit and reviewed outcome.

prose_target_outcomes:
The target outcome is a changed action space. After a successful frame shift, people can see a cause, constraint, relationship, responsibility, or path that was previously hidden. The problem statement becomes more useful because it supports better decisions.

Other target outcomes include reduced circular debate, better diagnosis, more legitimate stakeholder interpretation, safer assignment of responsibility, and concrete experiments or design changes that would not have emerged under the old frame.

prose_parameter_dimensions:
**Frame distance** controls how far the alternate frame is from the current one. A near frame is easier to adopt; a far frame may unlock more insight but create more resistance.

**Evidence grounding** controls how strongly the alternate frame must be supported before action. High-risk contexts need stronger grounding and smaller experiments.

**Disruption level** controls how much the frame shift challenges identity, expertise, status, or accountability. High disruption requires careful facilitation and stakeholder checks.

**Participation scope** controls who helps define and validate the new frame. Broader participation can improve legitimacy but may slow decisions.

**Action tightness** controls how quickly reframing must produce an operational next step. Tight action translation prevents endless reframing loops.

**Safeguard strength** controls how much reality checking, harm checking, and accountability checking is required before adoption.

prose_variants_and_near_names:
Important variants include appraisal reframing, perspective reorientation, metaphorical reframing, and causal layer reframing. Appraisal reframing targets emotional meaning and action readiness. Perspective reorientation changes viewpoint or spatial vantage. Metaphorical reframing changes the metaphor whose entailments guide action. Causal layer reframing moves among surface events, systemic causes, worldviews, and deeper narratives.

Near names include reframing for action, perspective shift, problem reframing, and frame-of-reference shift. Cognitive entrenchment disruption is captured as a merge-sensitive collapsed candidate: it names a common trigger for the parent archetype rather than a separate draft-ready archetype in this batch.

Scale Reframing and Dual-Frame Analysis should remain distinct sibling or child archetypes when their specific structures are central.

Appraisal Reframing

short_definition: Reinterpret a situation so emotional appraisal changes and a different action space becomes available.

distinctive_feature: The decisive change is the appraisal of meaning and emotional implication, not only an abstract conceptual frame.

distinct_from_parent: The parent changes interpretive frames generally; this variant targets affect-laden interpretation and its effect on action readiness.

still_same_parent_because: The operational move remains a deliberate shift from one interpretive frame to another, followed by action translation.

use_when: The current interpretation casts the situation as threat, futility, insult, inevitable failure, or personal inadequacy.

use_when: The emotional appraisal narrows perception and prevents feasible action, learning, repair, or negotiation.

Current Frame

role: Names the initial appraisal or interpretation that is narrowing action.

Alternate Frame

role: Supplies the challenge, learning, repair, or agency interpretation.

Action Translation

role: Converts changed appraisal into a grounded next step.

Challenge vs Threat Reframing

role: Recasts stress as demanding but manageable.

Failure-as-Feedback Framing

role: Treats failure as diagnostic information rather than identity proof.

Perspective-Taking Protocol

role: Introduces another vantage point for interpretation.

domain: learning

example: A failed attempt is reframed as evidence about which skill to practice next rather than proof of inability.

domain: organizational change

example: Resistance is reframed as information about transition cost instead of bad faith.

failure_modes: The reframing invalidates real harm, risk, or constraint.

failure_modes: Positive reinterpretation becomes denial rather than action.

Perspective Reorientation

short_definition: Change viewpoint, spatial orientation, or perceptual vantage so hidden relations or proportions become visible.

distinctive_feature: The change is viewpoint-based, spatial, perceptual, or experiential rather than primarily conceptual.

distinct_from_parent: The parent can be conceptual or social; this variant works by changing where the observer stands or how the scene is presented.

still_same_parent_because: A changed viewpoint still changes the interpretive frame that guides reasoning and action.

use_when: The current viewpoint hides depth, adjacency, proportion, relation, or relative priority.

use_when: A different spatial or experiential vantage changes what a participant can see or infer.

Current Viewpoint

role: Identifies the present vantage point.

Alternate Perspective

role: Introduces another vantage, angle, or position.

Hidden Structure

role: Names the relation obscured by the initial viewpoint.

Role Reversal Exercise

role: Lets participants reason from another position.

Spatial Modeling

role: Represents the situation physically or visually.

Coordinate Transformation Analogy

role: Uses a changed coordinate view to reveal invariants and artifacts.

example_domains: design conflict_resolution education strategy

domain: service design

example: A staff-centered queue view is reoriented into a customer journey view.

domain: conflict mediation

example: Each party maps the event from the other party's vantage before proposing remedies.

failure_modes: A new viewpoint is treated as automatically superior rather than partial.

failure_modes: The exercise produces empathy theater without changing decisions.

Metaphorical Reframing

short_definition: Use a different metaphor to change which relations, roles, risks, and actions feel natural.

distinctive_feature: The mechanism of change is the entailment structure of a metaphor: what the comparison makes seem obvious or irrelevant.

distinct_from_parent: The parent may shift frames without metaphor; this variant focuses on replacing or inspecting metaphorical structure.

still_same_parent_because: The metaphor functions as an interpretive frame that governs what actions become thinkable.

source_primes: metaphor framing representation

use_when: The current metaphor imports misleading entailments, such as war, machine, marketplace, family, journey, or game assumptions.

use_when: A new metaphor can reveal neglected roles, responsibilities, constraints, or intervention paths.

Metaphor Entailment Map

role: Lists what the metaphor implies about roles and action.

Alternate Metaphor

role: Supplies a different comparison with different affordances.

Reality Constraint Check

role: Prevents the metaphor from overriding evidence.

Metaphor Shift Method

role: Generates and tests alternate metaphors.

Problem Restatement Prompt

role: Restates the issue under the new metaphor.

example_domains:
strategy
education
health communication
organizational_change

example: A transformation is reframed from a battle against resistance to a migration that needs routes, support, and checkpoints.

failure_modes: The new metaphor hides harms or obligations that the old metaphor at least exposed.

failure_modes: A vivid metaphor substitutes for evidence.

Causal Layer Reframing

variant_type: subtype

short_definition: Reframe an issue across surface events, systemic causes, worldviews, and deep narratives to expose different intervention levels.

distinctive_feature: It has a recurring layered structure rather than a single alternate frame.

distinct_from_parent: The parent requires any effective alternate frame; this variant specifically moves through causal or narrative layers.

still_same_parent_because: The practical effect is still a frame shift that makes a new action path visible.

use_when: The current frame treats surface events as the whole problem.

use_when: Changing causal layer reveals different responsibilities, constraints, or interventions.

Surface Frame

role: Names the visible event or symptom frame.

Layered Causal Frame

role: Introduces systemic, worldview, or narrative layers.

Layer-Specific Intervention Translation

role: Links each layer to a possible intervention type.

Layered Causal Prompt

role: Walks the case through event, system, worldview, and narrative layers.

domain: strategy

example: A recurring product failure is reframed from individual mistakes to process incentives and then to the organization's theory of quality.

failure_modes: Layering becomes speculative storytelling without evidence.

failure_modes: Deep narrative analysis delays necessary surface action.

near_names:
Reframing for Action
Cognitive Reframing
Perspective Shift
Problem Restatement
Role Reversal


Framing Effect Audit

type: archetype

source: generated

batch: First Iteration/Batch 36/Wave 2

source_primes: framing representation observer_effect

slug: anchoring

slug: invariance

components:
Framing Variable Inventory
Alternate Presentation Set
Response Comparison Design
Frame Effect Threshold
Equivalence or Difference Record
Frame Disclosure or Selection Rule
Audience Segment Map
Downstream Use Context
Frame Neutrality Claim

mechanisms:
Wording Test
Order-Effect Check
Gain/Loss Frame Comparison
Dashboard Framing Review
Survey Frame Split Sample
Visual Framing Audit
Baseline Reference Swap
Blinded Frame Review
Presentation Sensitivity Table

essence_one_line: Audit how presentation choices influence perception, judgment, and decision before treating a response or conclusion as stable.

compression_statement: When the same underlying information can produce different conclusions because of wording, order, visuals, baselines, defaults, or reference frames, identify the frame variables, compare alternate presentations, measure or interpret shifts, and choose, redesign, or disclose the frame with materiality in view.

core_intuition: A conclusion is not always a property of the underlying situation; sometimes it is partly a property of the way the situation was presented. Framing Effect Audit makes that dependence visible before downstream users mistake a frame-sensitive result for a stable judgment.

canonical_formula: underlying_information + presentation_frame -> interpretation_shift; audit(frame_variables, alternate_presentations, response_shift, materiality_threshold) -> selection | redesign | disclosure | multi_frame_output

structural_problem: A decision, survey, dashboard, evaluation, message, or comparison may produce different conclusions because of presentation choices rather than because the underlying situation has changed.

condition: The same facts can be worded, ordered, visualized, categorized, or compared in multiple plausible ways.

condition: Responses or decisions will be treated as evidence of preference, risk, priority, performance, fairness, or truth.

condition: Small changes in labels, baselines, defaults, denominators, or visual emphasis may change interpretation or action.

condition: The actor creating the presentation has an incentive, habit, or blind spot that may make one frame appear natural.

condition: The output will travel to downstream users who may not know that presentation choices shaped the result.

symptom: Different teams reach different conclusions from substantively similar information because each sees a different display, order, or wording.

symptom: A survey, message, dashboard, or evaluation result changes noticeably after minor wording, visual, or baseline edits.

symptom: Stakeholders argue about whether a presentation is neutral, manipulative, alarming, misleading, or incomplete.

symptom: Decision makers accept a single presentation as definitive even though plausible alternative presentations are available.

symptom: A preferred frame is justified after the fact because it produced the desired response.

root_tension: Every presentation makes some aspects salient and others less visible, but decisions often need to know whether the resulting judgment reflects the underlying information or the chosen frame.

condition: The goal is simply to persuade an audience toward a desired answer without preserving interpretation validity or disclosure.

condition: The problem is that people need a new action-enabling frame, not an audit of presentation sensitivity.

condition: The representation is plainly wrong or incomplete; the immediate task is correction, not comparison of plausible frames.

condition: The comparison changes substantive facts rather than presentation variables, and those differences are not documented.

condition: No decision, inference, evidence claim, or downstream use depends on the response difference.

structural_intervention: Identify the presentation variables that could shape interpretation, construct plausible alternate presentations, compare response or judgment shifts, evaluate materiality, and either redesign, disclose, pluralize, or select the presentation according to an explicit rule.

logic: Name the decision, inference, or response that could become frame-sensitive.

logic: Inventory the presentation variables: wording, order, labels, defaults, units, baselines, denominators, visual emphasis, comparison class, and reference point.

logic: Build alternate presentations that keep underlying information equivalent or explicitly document substantive differences.

logic: Compare interpretations, decisions, confidence, priorities, or intended actions across the presentations using a design proportionate to the stakes.

logic: Apply a materiality threshold to decide whether the observed shift matters for the downstream use.

logic: Select, redesign, disclose, or present multiple frames so downstream users do not mistake a frame-sensitive result for a stable conclusion.

logic: Archive the frame variables, tested alternates, observed shifts, and final rule so the audit is reviewable.

rule: Use this archetype when the presentation channel may alter the interpretation of otherwise similar information.

rule: Increase audit rigor as stakes, vulnerability, irreversibility, or downstream reliance increase.

rule: If alternate presentations yield materially different conclusions, disclose frame sensitivity or redesign the presentation before relying on the result.

rule: If the preferred presentation is selected because it produces a desired response, classify the work as persuasion or manipulation risk unless validity and disclosure are preserved.

rule: If the intervention only changes to a more actionable frame without testing frame sensitivity, route to Frame Shift Intervention or a framing variant rather than this archetype.

invariant: The underlying information and substantive differences must be clear enough to distinguish frame effects from content changes.

invariant: The audit must preserve interpretive validity rather than optimizing for the answer the designer wants.

invariant: Frame variables, alternate presentations, and comparison logic must remain visible and reviewable.

invariant: Detected material frame sensitivity must reach downstream users through disclosure, redesign, or multi-frame presentation.

invariant: The audit should not pretend that a single perfectly neutral frame always exists.

outcome: Decision makers know when a conclusion is stable across frames and when it is presentation-sensitive.

outcome: Surveys, dashboards, messages, and evaluations are less likely to smuggle in hidden baselines, defaults, or value judgments.

outcome: Downstream users can interpret results with appropriate caution, context, and disclosure.

outcome: Presentation choices become design decisions with documented rationale rather than invisible defaults.

outcome: Manipulative or answer-seeking framing is easier to detect and challenge.

prose_essence:
Framing Effect Audit is the intervention pattern for situations where a conclusion may depend on how information is presented. It asks whether people are responding to the underlying situation or to wording, ordering, visual emphasis, baseline choice, default structure, or reference frame. The archetype does not assume that one perfectly neutral frame exists. Instead, it makes frame sensitivity visible so the presentation can be redesigned, disclosed, pluralized, or selected with a defensible rationale.

The core move is to treat presentation as an audit object. The team identifies which frame variables may matter, constructs plausible alternate presentations, compares the resulting interpretations or decisions, and then decides what downstream users need to know.

prose_when_to_use:
Use this archetype when a survey, dashboard, decision aid, evaluation, report, interface, or message will be treated as evidence, yet the response may change if the same information is presented differently. It is especially useful when wording, option order, chart scale, denominator, baseline, comparison class, label, default, or gain/loss language could change perceived risk, fairness, urgency, priority, or value.

It is less appropriate when the goal is simply to persuade. It also does not replace Frame Shift Intervention: if the task is to find a more useful interpretive frame for action, use a frame-shift pattern. Use Framing Effect Audit when the question is whether conclusions are stable across plausible presentations.

prose_structural_problem:
The structural problem is that presentation choices can become hidden causal inputs into judgment. A decision maker may believe they are seeing a stable preference, risk estimate, ranking, or evaluation when they are actually seeing the output of a specific frame. Because presentation feels like packaging rather than substance, its effects are often under-documented.

This creates several risks: a survey can appear to measure public preference when it is partly measuring wording; a dashboard can appear to show priority when it is partly showing baseline choice; an evaluation can appear objective when evidence order or labels shape interpretation; a risk message can appear informative while steering action through gain/loss framing.

prose_intervention_logic:
The intervention begins by naming the decision or inference that could become frame-sensitive. It then inventories possible frame variables and constructs alternate presentations. Those alternates are compared through user testing, expert review, split samples, sensitivity tables, or other mechanisms appropriate to the stakes.

The audit does not stop at detection. It applies a materiality threshold: did the frame change interpretation enough to matter for the decision? If not, the result may be treated as reasonably robust. If yes, the team must decide whether to redesign the presentation, disclose frame sensitivity, present multiple frames, or avoid relying on a single framed response.

prose_key_components:
### Framing Variable Inventory

This component names the presentation choices that might steer judgment. It includes wording, order, labels, units, baselines, denominators, defaults, comparison classes, visual emphasis, and reference points. Without this inventory, the work tends to become vague message testing.

### Alternate Presentation Set

The alternate presentation set creates plausible versions of the same underlying information. These versions are not arbitrary variants; they are designed to isolate meaningful frame variables. When substantive content differs, that difference must be documented.

### Response Comparison Design

A framing audit needs a way to compare interpretation across frames. The comparison may be qualitative, quantitative, split-sample, expert-review, or simulation-based. The key is that the design observes the response or decision that the frame may change.

### Frame Effect Threshold

Not every difference matters. This component defines when an observed shift is large or consequential enough to require disclosure, redesign, or multi-frame presentation. The threshold should become stricter when stakes are higher.

### Equivalence or Difference Record

This record protects the audit from false comparison. It states what information is held constant across presentations and what differs. It helps reviewers distinguish a true framing effect from a substantive information change.

### Frame Disclosure or Selection Rule

The audit must end with a decision about what to do with frame sensitivity. The rule may call for one presentation, multiple presentations, a disclosure note, redesign, or rejection of a frame-sensitive result for a particular downstream use.

prose_common_mechanisms:
A wording test compares alternative labels, phrases, question stems, or descriptions. It is a mechanism, not the archetype, because the archetype also requires an explicit frame inventory, response comparison, materiality threshold, and disclosure or selection rule.

An order-effect check varies the sequence of questions, options, evidence, or visual elements. It implements the archetype when order is treated as a frame variable that may change interpretation.

A gain/loss frame comparison presents equivalent outcomes as gains, losses, avoided losses, costs, savings, survival, or failure. It is useful when valence or reference point changes perceived desirability or risk.

A dashboard framing review audits display choices such as units, scales, color, baselines, sorting, default filters, and missing denominators. The dashboard itself is not the archetype; it is the artifact whose presentation choices are being audited.

A survey frame split sample assigns people to alternate presentations so response differences can be estimated. It supports the audit when the split is designed around frame variables and downstream interpretation.

A visual framing audit reviews charts, images, icons, scale, color, cropping, and layout for salience or implied comparison effects. A presentation sensitivity table records the tested variables, alternate frames, observed shifts, thresholds, and final decision.

prose_failure_modes:
One failure mode is generic testing drift: the audit becomes ordinary A/B testing or usability testing. The mitigation is to require explicit frame variables, equivalence records, response comparison, and materiality thresholds.

Another failure mode is answer-seeking frame choice. The team selects the frame that produces the desired result and calls it validated. Blinded review, documentation, and separate selection criteria help reduce this risk.

A third failure mode is hidden frame sensitivity. The team detects material frame effects but passes a single result downstream without disclosure. The output rule should make disclosure, redesign, or multi-frame presentation mandatory when thresholds are crossed.

A fourth failure mode is false equivalence. Alternate presentations may differ in content, denominator, or scope. The equivalence or difference record is the mitigation.

prose_neighbor_distinctions:
Framing Effect Audit is distinct from Frame Shift Intervention because it tests frame sensitivity rather than simply moving to a more useful frame. It is distinct from Reframing for Action because the goal is not to unlock action through a new frame, but to determine whether conclusions depend on the frame.

It is distinct from Cognitive Representation Externalization because externalization makes implicit mental structure inspectable, while this archetype audits how presentation alternatives change judgment. It is distinct from Meta-Symbolic Rule Reflection because it does not primarily revise a symbol or rule system; it compares how presentation choices affect interpretation.

It is distinct from generic A/B testing because optimization is not enough. A/B testing can implement the audit only when the test is explicitly about framing variables, interpretation validity, materiality, and downstream disclosure.

It is adjacent to Observer Effect Accounting and Representation Invariance Check. Observer Effect Accounting focuses on observation changing the observed system; Framing Effect Audit focuses on presentation changing the observer's response. Representation Invariance Check tests stability under equivalent representations; Framing Effect Audit includes that concern but adds disclosure and redesign choices.

prose_cross_domain_examples:
In survey design, a team compares whether respondents answer differently when a program is described as a tax, investment, benefit, or service. The audit prevents a single phrasing from masquerading as stable public preference.

In operations, a dashboard team compares raw counts, incident rates, severity-weighted scores, and trend displays. The audit reveals whether priority judgments are driven by underlying risk or by display choices.

In risk communication, an organization compares absolute-risk, relative-risk, natural-frequency, and gain/loss presentations before publishing a decision aid. The audit makes sure the chosen frame supports fair understanding rather than hidden steering.

In evaluation, reviewers test whether seeing narrative examples before scores changes ratings. The audit surfaces whether evidence order frames the evaluation.

In product design, a team checks whether labels and default order make one option appear recommended when no recommendation is intended. The audit detects implied endorsement created by presentation.

prose_non_examples:
A campaign choosing the most persuasive wording and hiding alternatives is not Framing Effect Audit. It is persuasion optimization.

A facilitator reframing a conflict from blame to shared problem solving is not this archetype unless the intervention audits how alternate frames change interpretation. It is closer to a frame-shift pattern.

A designer improving spacing, typography, or visual polish is not this archetype unless the work tests whether those choices change judgment or decision.

A generic A/B test that optimizes conversion is not this archetype unless it explicitly treats presentation as a frame variable and addresses validity, materiality, and disclosure.

prose_tradeoffs:
The main tradeoff is rigor versus speed. More alternatives, more reviewers, and stronger comparison designs improve confidence but take time.

Another tradeoff is neutrality versus plural framing. Sometimes no single presentation is neutral enough, and the more honest output is to show multiple frames. That improves transparency but can increase cognitive load.

There is also a standardization tradeoff. A standard frame improves comparability, while tailored frames may improve comprehension for particular audiences. The audit should state which value matters for the downstream use.

prose_invariants_to_preserve:
The audit must preserve traceability from frame variable to observed response. It must also preserve honesty about equivalence: if the underlying information changes, the audit should say so.

It should preserve interpretive validity rather than optimizing for the designer's preferred answer. It should also preserve downstream transparency when frame effects are material. Finally, it should preserve the humility that all presentations frame reality to some degree; the goal is not frame-free communication but accountable framing.

prose_target_outcomes:
A successful Framing Effect Audit tells decision makers whether a conclusion is robust across plausible presentations. It reveals when a survey response, dashboard interpretation, evaluation score, or risk judgment is partly presentation-dependent.

The practical outcomes are better disclosure, fairer presentation design, more cautious interpretation of frame-sensitive results, and reduced risk that hidden baselines, defaults, or labels will steer decisions without accountability.

prose_parameter_dimensions:
The first tuning dimension is audit rigor. Low-stakes contexts may use expert review or a small comparison; high-stakes contexts may need split samples, blinded review, segmentation, and formal documentation.

The second dimension is frame breadth. A narrow audit may test one wording change; a broad audit may test wording, order, visual scale, denominator, baseline, and default structure together.

The third dimension is equivalence strictness. Some audits require mathematically equivalent presentations. Others compare plausible but not identical presentations, provided the substantive differences are documented.

The fourth dimension is audience segmentation. If different groups interpret frames differently, the audit may need segment-level comparison rather than average effects.

The fifth dimension is the output rule. The audit can select one frame, redesign a frame, disclose sensitivity, present multiple frames, or treat the result as too frame-sensitive for unsupported use.

prose_variants_and_near_names:
Survey Framing Audit focuses on question wording, order, labels, response options, and context effects. Dashboard Framing Audit focuses on displays, baselines, color, units, sorting, defaults, and visual emphasis. Gain/Loss Framing Audit focuses on equivalent outcomes presented as gains, losses, costs, savings, survival, or failure.

Reference-Point Framing Audit focuses on denominators, baselines, comparison classes, and defaults. Risk Communication Frame Audit focuses on risk formats such as absolute risk, relative risk, frequency, severity, and uncertainty language.

Near names include Presentation Sensitivity Test, Framing Effect Check, Frame Bias Check, Wording Effect Audit, and Visual Framing Review. Concrete names such as Wording Test, Order-Effect Check, Survey Wording Test, and Generic A/B Testing should usually be treated as mechanisms unless they preserve the full audit logic.

raw_bundle_path: solution_archetypes/_Batches/First Iteration/Batch 36/Wave 2/framing_effect_audit_solution_archetype_output_bundle.zip

Survey Framing Audit

short_definition: Audit how question wording, order, labels, response options, and context alter survey responses before interpreting results.

distinctive_feature: The variant centers survey or elicitation instruments and uses split samples, cognitive interviews, or wording comparisons to detect frame effects.

distinct_from_parent: The parent applies to any presentation-mediated judgment; this variant specializes the audit around response elicitation and interpretation.

still_same_parent_because: It still follows the same logic of inventorying frame variables, testing alternate presentations, comparing response shifts, and disclosing or redesigning based on material effects.

source_primes: framing observer_effect representation

condition: A survey, interview, evaluation, or consultation result may depend on wording or question order.

condition: Responses will be treated as evidence for policy, product, research, diagnosis, or organizational choice.

condition: The same underlying issue can be presented through multiple plausible terms, examples, or option structures.

Framing Variable Inventory

role: Names wording, order, label, and option-structure variables.

Response Comparison Design

role: Defines how response differences are interpreted.

Frame Effect Threshold

role: Determines whether the survey result is frame-sensitive.

Wording Test

role: Compares alternate phrases or question stems.

Survey Frame Split Sample

mechanism_type: protocol

role: Estimates response differences across frames.

failure_mode: Treating the most favorable wording as the most valid wording.

failure_mode: Ignoring order or context effects after testing only isolated words.

Dashboard Framing Audit

short_definition: Audit whether a dashboard or decision display steers judgment through defaults, layout, color, units, baselines, sorting, or missing context.

distinctive_feature: The variant focuses on display-level representation choices rather than survey wording or verbal frames.

distinct_from_parent: The parent includes any presentation channel; this variant is tuned for dashboards, reports, charts, and decision-support displays.

still_same_parent_because: It applies the same frame-variable, alternate-presentation, comparison, threshold, and disclosure logic.

source_primes: framing representation

condition: A dashboard, report, or metric display influences prioritization, urgency, triage, allocation, or performance judgment.

condition: Different visual or metric presentations could make the same situation appear better, worse, riskier, or more urgent.

Alternate Presentation Set

role: Creates alternate visual or metric displays.

Downstream Use Context

role: Identifies decisions shaped by the display.

Frame Disclosure or Selection Rule

role: Determines display choice or disclosure.

Dashboard Framing Review

role: Reviews baselines, units, colors, sorting, and context.

Visual Framing Audit

mechanism_type: checklist

role: Audits salient visual features.

failure_mode: Optimizing appearance while ignoring whether the display distorts priority or risk.

failure_mode: Treating visual clarity as sufficient even when the chosen baseline changes interpretation.

Gain/Loss Framing Audit

short_definition: Audit whether equivalent outcomes produce different judgments when presented as gains, losses, savings, costs, survival, or failure.

distinctive_feature: The decisive variable is valence and reference point rather than all presentation choices generally.

distinct_from_parent: The parent covers many frame variables; this variant isolates gain/loss equivalence and reference-point effects.

still_same_parent_because: It still audits the effect of alternate presentations and makes material frame sensitivity explicit.

source_primes: framing anchoring

condition: Equivalent outcomes can be described through benefit, loss, avoided loss, cost, or risk language.

condition: Risk, investment, policy, safety, or health decisions may shift because the same information is framed as gain or loss.

Equivalence or Difference Record

role: Confirms that gain and loss descriptions are substantively equivalent.

Frame Effect Threshold

role: Determines whether response shifts matter.

Gain/Loss Frame Comparison

role: Compares gain and loss presentations.

Baseline Reference Swap

mechanism_type: method

role: Tests the reference point behind the gain or loss.

failure_mode: Presenting gain/loss frames as equivalent when denominators or baselines differ.

failure_mode: Choosing the valence that nudges the preferred answer without disclosure.

Reference-Point Framing Audit

short_definition: Audit whether changing the baseline, comparison group, denominator, or reference point changes the interpretation of the same result.

distinctive_feature: The central frame variable is the reference point used to make magnitude or direction meaningful.

distinct_from_parent: The parent audits presentation effects broadly; this variant focuses on baseline and reference-class sensitivity.

still_same_parent_because: It uses alternate presentations to expose judgment shifts induced by reference choices.

source_primes: framing anchoring frame_of_reference

condition: Metrics or claims depend heavily on comparison classes, baselines, denominators, defaults, or historical references.

condition: Stakeholders may interpret the same outcome differently depending on what it is compared against.

Framing Variable Inventory

role: Names candidate baselines, denominators, and comparison classes.

Equivalence or Difference Record

role: Distinguishes a frame shift from a data change.

Baseline Reference Swap

role: Compares plausible baselines and reference classes.

Presentation Sensitivity Table

mechanism_type: template

role: Records the effect of baseline changes.

failure_mode: Treating one baseline as natural when it is actually a strategic or historical choice.

Risk Communication Frame Audit

short_definition: Audit whether risk information changes interpretation when presented through absolute risk, relative risk, natural frequency, probability, severity, or uncertainty language.

distinctive_feature: The variant combines frame sensitivity with risk representation and denominator choices.

distinct_from_parent: The parent is domain-general; this variant specializes on risk communication where format changes often affect comprehension and action.

still_same_parent_because: It audits alternate presentations and makes frame-induced interpretation shifts explicit before action.

condition: Risk decisions depend on how probability, severity, uncertainty, and comparison populations are presented.

condition: Equivalent risk information may produce materially different action because of denominator, format, or salience choices.

Alternate Presentation Set

role: Constructs absolute, relative, frequency, and severity presentations.

Response Comparison Design

role: Compares comprehension, urgency, and action intention across presentations.

Gain/Loss Frame Comparison

role: Tests valence sensitivity.

Visual Framing Audit

role: Audits visual risk displays.

failure_mode: Using the audit to select the most alarming or reassuring frame rather than the clearest and fairest representation.

near_names:
Presentation Sensitivity Test
Framing Effect Check
Wording Effect Audit
Visual Framing Review
Frame Bias Check
Survey Wording Test
Message A/B Test


Free-Rider Mitigation

batch: Batch 23

aliases:
shared-good contribution assurance
contribution-aligned access design
free-rider control
common-benefit contribution alignment

slug: reciprocity

slug: accountability

slug: observability

slug: equity

slug: monitoring

slug: proportionality

components:
Shared-Good Boundary
Benefit and Burden Map
Contribution Obligation
Contribution Capacity Profile
Fair-Share Rule
Assurance Threshold
Contribution Visibility Boundary
Exemption and Hardship Path
Graduated Response Ladder
Legitimacy and Appeal Channel
Provision Health Signal
Contribution Recognition
Selective Benefit Boundary

mechanisms:
Assurance Contract
Matching Contribution Scheme
Membership Dues or Assessment
Contribution Ledger
Contribution Review Cadence
Graduated Sanction Protocol
Reciprocal Access Rule
Volunteer or Maintenance Rota
Hardship Waiver Process

essence_one_line: Protect a shared good from chronic undercontribution by making obligations fair, visible, achievable, and consequential without punishing legitimate inability.

compression_statement: Define the shared-good boundary, beneficiaries, provision target, fair-share rule, and contribution capacity; create assurance that others will contribute; observe contribution with privacy and gaming safeguards; distinguish unwillingness from inability; and apply graduated access, incentive, recognition, or sanction responses while preserving appeal and continued provision.

core_intuition: People rationally withhold contribution when benefits remain available regardless of effort, when others' participation is uncertain, or when obligations appear unfair. Mitigation works by changing that structure—not by moralizing every shortfall.

canonical_formula: durable_provision = fair_obligation + contribution_assurance + observable_follow_through + capacity_adjustment + proportionate_consequence + legitimate_appeal

structural_problem: A shared benefit is difficult or undesirable to exclude, yet provision depends on voluntary or weakly enforced contributions. Participants can retain benefits while shifting production or maintenance costs onto others, causing resentment, withdrawal, overload, or collapse of the good.

trigger_conditions: Benefits are shared more broadly than contribution burdens.

trigger_conditions: Individual contributions are costly, weakly observable, or easy to avoid.

trigger_conditions: Participants doubt that enough others will contribute.

trigger_conditions: Repeated undercontribution threatens a provision or maintenance threshold.

trigger_conditions: Uniform contribution demands ignore materially different capacity or benefit.

symptoms: A stable minority performs most shared maintenance or funding.

symptoms: Contributors reduce effort because noncontributors receive the same benefit.

symptoms: Contribution appeals grow more moralizing while participation continues to fall.

symptoms: Records measure visible activity but miss essential care, coordination, or in-kind work.

symptoms: Sanctions fall on low-capacity participants while powerful beneficiaries avoid obligation.

root_tension: Broad access creates social value, but unconditional access weakens individual incentives to bear provision costs. Strong exclusion or punishment can restore contribution while undermining the very publicness, equity, trust, or legitimacy the good serves.

anti_signatures: The good is already fully funded and marginal noncontribution does not threaten provision or fairness.

anti_signatures: Contribution is impossible to define without destroying essential autonomy, privacy, or open access.

anti_signatures: The main issue is accidental coordination failure rather than strategic undercontribution.

anti_signatures: One principal delegates work to agents; principal-agent alignment is the more precise pattern.

anti_signatures: Resource depletion comes from overuse rather than underprovision; commons governance may be primary.

structural_intervention: Couple continued shared benefit with a legitimate, capacity-sensitive contribution system that provides assurance, visibility, recognition, correction, and proportionate consequences.

action_logic: Define the shared good, provision level, beneficiaries, contributors, and maintenance horizon.

action_logic: Identify how noncontribution shifts cost, risk, delay, or overload onto others.

action_logic: Set a fair-share rule tied to benefit, capacity, causation, membership, or an explicit hybrid.

action_logic: Make qualifying financial, labor, in-kind, maintenance, and coordination contributions legible.

action_logic: Establish an assurance threshold showing that contribution will matter and others will also participate.

action_logic: Provide accessible contribution pathways and an exemption or hardship process.

action_logic: Detect persistent strategic undercontribution without treating every shortfall as defection.

action_logic: Apply a graduated ladder from reminder and assistance through reciprocal limits, fees, or sanctions.

action_logic: Preserve essential access, due process, privacy, and proportionality.

action_logic: Review provision, burden distribution, gaming, and contributor exit; recalibrate the rule.

decision_rules: Use the least coercive lever that reliably protects provision and contributor fairness.

decision_rules: Scale obligations to a declared fairness basis rather than demanding identical inputs from unequal capacities.

decision_rules: Do not sanction until obligation, ability, notice, evidence, and appeal have been checked.

decision_rules: Restrict optional or rival benefits before essential or rights-based access.

decision_rules: Escalate only for persistent, material, and avoidable noncontribution.

decision_rules: Recalibrate when monitoring burden or enforcement cost exceeds the contribution recovered.

target_invariants: The shared good remains sufficiently provided and maintained.

target_invariants: Contribution obligations are public, understandable, and consistently applied.

target_invariants: Legitimate inability is distinguished from strategic avoidance.

target_invariants: Essential rights and safety are not conditioned on punitive contribution demands.

target_invariants: Contribution records protect privacy and recognize nonfinancial forms of value.

target_invariants: Responses remain proportionate, appealable, and reversible where possible.

expected_outcomes: Higher and more stable contribution participation.

expected_outcomes: Lower overload and resentment among reliable contributors.

expected_outcomes: Greater confidence that individual contribution will not be exploited.

expected_outcomes: Earlier detection of provision risk and unfair burden concentration.

expected_outcomes: Reduced strategic noncontribution without exclusion of legitimate low-capacity participants.

prose_failure_modes:
Common failures are punishing inability, rewarding visible busywork, excessive monitoring,
elite exemptions, enforcement costs that exceed recovered value, exclusion that destroys
the public good, and incentives that crowd out civic motivation. Each reflects a broken
link between legitimate obligation and proportionate response.

| Observed symptom | Likely failure | Evidence to inspect | First corrective move |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Contributions stay below threshold despite stated support | Assurance failure | Activation, match credibility, refund rules | Make conditional activation credible |
| Recorded activity rises while provision does not | Measurement gaming | Credit rules, quality checks, output link | Credit verified provision value |
| Waivers cluster among one group | Allocation or access failure | Capacity barriers, obligation basis | Redesign shares and waiver access |
| Sanctions concentrate among low-power participants | Selective enforcement | Comparable cases, authority, reversals | Add independent review |
| Reliable contributors leave | Burden concentration or crowd-out | Top-contributor share, backlog, fairness | Rebalance and simplify |
| Monitoring cost outgrows recovered value | Enforcement-cost spiral | Staff time, disputes, recovered provision | Reduce granularity or retire controls |
| Optional restrictions expand into basic service | Public-good erosion | Benefit classification, exceptions | Restore protected baseline access |

Diagnose whether the model, data, rule, or action failed. A correct rule can use stale
data; accurate data can feed an illegitimate rule; a legitimate rule can be enforced
selectively. Separating these layers prevents every failure from being answered with more
monitoring or harsher sanctions.

prose_non_examples:
A one-time missed shift is not free riding. Ordinary fundraising without burden alignment
is public-goods provision. Repeated-game reciprocity alone belongs to its accepted owner.
Employee surveillance without a legitimate shared-good obligation is not mitigation; it
is monitoring without the archetype's fairness and legitimacy structure.

A participant blocked by an inaccessible channel is not a free rider. Neither is a new
member without notice, someone whose care or maintenance work is missing from the ledger,
or a person contesting an illegitimate obligation. These require access repair, record
correction, or governance review.

Public shaming, leaderboards without a fair-share basis, and automatic exclusion based on
raw activity are also non-examples. They are enforcement artifacts missing assurance,
capacity, protected access, appeal, and provision-health logic.

prose_tradeoffs:
Visibility supports assurance but invites surveillance and gaming. Consequences improve
compliance but can crowd out trust. Capacity adjustment improves equity but requires
sensitive administration. Selective access protects contributors but can erode publicness.
The design must compare recovered provision with monitoring and enforcement cost.

A precision-legitimacy tradeoff also matters. A single score is easy to compare but can
encode contested judgments about money, expertise, time, care, risk, and availability.
Multiple categories preserve meaning but make assurance and enforcement harder. Use exact
conversion only where a legitimate exchange rate exists; otherwise use minimum obligations,
bands, or separate qualifying paths.

Threshold-Assurance Contribution

short_definition: Activate pledges only when enough contributors commit to make provision viable.

distinctive_feature: Conditional activation supplies mutual assurance.

distinct_from_parent: Makes assurance rather than enforcement the primary lever.

still_same_parent_because: It aligns contribution to protect shared provision.

use_when: Potential contributors fear acting alone.

use_when: The good has a credible provision threshold.

domain: crowdfunding

example: Collect pledges only if the maintenance target is reached.

failure_modes:
Threshold manipulation
Pledges fail after activation

Capacity-Adjusted Contribution

short_definition: Scale contribution obligations to materially different capacity while preserving shared responsibility.

distinctive_feature: Fair share is proportional rather than identical.

distinct_from_parent: Makes capacity adjustment structurally central.

still_same_parent_because: It retains obligation, visibility, assurance, and response logic.

source_primes: free_riding equity proportionality

use_when: Participants have unequal resources or access.

use_when: Uniform obligations would exclude legitimate beneficiaries.

domain: cooperatives

example: Use sliding dues plus service contributions.

failure_modes:
Intrusive capacity assessment
Strategic underreporting

Maintenance Free-Rider Control

short_definition: Protect recurring upkeep after initial creation by assigning replenishment and repair obligations.

distinctive_feature: Focuses on recurring lifecycle contribution rather than initial provision.

distinct_from_parent: Uses maintenance horizon and burden concentration as primary signals.

still_same_parent_because: It addresses benefit without proportionate contribution.

use_when: Creation attracts support but maintenance does not.

use_when: Deferred upkeep creates hidden contributor overload.

example: Rotate release and security maintenance with sponsor funding.

failure_modes: Invisible maintenance remains uncredited

near_names:
Shared-Good Contribution Assurance
Contribution-Aligned Access Design
Free-Rider Control


Function-Without-Intent Caution

batch: First Iteration/Batch 42/Wave 2

source_primes: teleology causality

slug: teleology

slug: causality

slug: function

components:
Observed Function
Intent Evidence Check
Origin-Function Distinction
Current Use Map
Causal Pathway Context
Attribution Boundary
Explanation Update
Intervention Implication
Counterfactual Origin Test
Maintenance Choice Record
Beneficiary-Harm Map

mechanisms:
Functional Analysis
Intent Audit
Institutional Genealogy
Design History Review
Root-Cause Explanation Review
Attribution Check
Current Use Mapping
Evidence Threshold Table

essence_one_line: Avoid assuming that because something has a function, it was intentionally designed for that purpose.

compression_statement: When a pattern, artifact, behavior, institution, or system produces a visible function, separate the observed function from original cause, actor intent, design purpose, current maintenance, and responsibility before explaining or intervening.

core_intuition: Function is evidence that something does something, not proof that someone meant it to do that thing. Good action requires distinguishing current effects from origin stories and intent claims, while still addressing harms or benefits that persist in the present.

canonical_formula: observed_function + intent_evidence_check + origin_function_distinction + current_use_map -> scoped_explanation_and_action

structural_problem: Actors observe that something serves a purpose-like role and infer that it must have been intentionally designed, originally created, or morally intended for that role. The result is overconfident explanation, misplaced blame, missed accountability for current maintenance, or poor intervention design.

condition: A pattern or artifact appears to “serve a purpose” even though its origin or intent is unclear.

why_it_matters: Purpose-like language can smuggle in an unsupported claim about design or intention.

condition: People are debating whether an institution, rule, design feature, biological trait, or social practice was meant to produce its current effect.

why_it_matters: The debate mixes empirical evidence, causal explanation, moral blame, and practical reform.

condition: A current harm or benefit is being used as proof of original motive.

why_it_matters: Current function can result from drift, adaptation, incentives, emergence, or later maintenance.

condition: An actor uses lack of explicit intent to dismiss the importance of current effects.

why_it_matters: The archetype cautions against over-attributing intent, but does not excuse harmful functions that are knowingly maintained.

condition: A redesign or intervention depends on whether the current function is intended, accidental, emergent, or repurposed.

why_it_matters: The appropriate action differs depending on the explanatory status of the function.

symptom: People say “this exists to do X” when the only evidence is that it currently does X.

interpretation: Function is being treated as evidence of intent.

symptom: A harmful effect is dismissed because no one admits intending it.

interpretation: Lack of original intent is being confused with lack of current responsibility.

symptom: A beneficial emergent workaround is forced back into the official design rationale.

interpretation: Current use is being projected backward onto origin.

symptom: A causal explanation uses purpose-language but no mechanism.

interpretation: Teleological explanation may be replacing causal mechanism mapping.

symptom: Blame, praise, or design credit is assigned before evidence of intention is examined.

interpretation: Attribution has outrun evidence.

root_tension: The archetype manages the tension between explanatory caution and practical accountability: function alone cannot prove intent, but unintended function can still matter and may still require intervention.

case: The goal is to align a known purpose, metric, or end state with actions and design choices.

case: The main task is to map the causal pathway connecting a cause to an effect, with intent not central.

case: The error is primarily attributing a person’s behavior to disposition rather than situation.

case: The task is to infer design logic from an existing artifact for replication, adaptation, or learning.

case: The issue is interpreting a past actor within historical context rather than separating function from intent.

case: The issue is whether a category is being treated as having a fixed inherent essence.

structural_intervention: Name the observed function, gather evidence about origin and intent, separate current use from original purpose, map how the function is maintained, define an attribution boundary, update the explanation, and select an intervention that fits the evidence rather than the assumed purpose story.

Name the observed function

description: Describe what the pattern currently does without using intent-loaded language.

State the intent claim

description: Identify the claim being made or implied about design purpose, motive, original rationale, blame, or responsibility.

Check intent evidence

description: Review direct and indirect evidence for deliberate design, explicit motive, foreseeable effect, repeated maintenance, or after-the-fact rationalization.

Separate origin from current function

description: Distinguish original cause or design rationale from current use, emergent adaptation, institutional drift, and present beneficiaries or harms.

Map the maintaining pathway

description: Identify the causal, incentive, technical, social, or ecological mechanisms that keep producing the observed function.

Set the attribution boundary

description: Clarify what can be attributed to intent, design, negligence, emergent dynamics, current maintenance, or accountable choice.

Update explanation and action

description: Replace the over-attributed story with a scoped explanation and choose a corresponding intervention: investigate, redesign, preserve, repurpose, stop, disclose, or monitor.

rule: Do not infer intent from function alone.

rationale: Something can be useful, harmful, stabilizing, or adaptive without having been intentionally designed for that role.

rule: Do not infer lack of responsibility from lack of original intent alone.

rationale: Actors may still maintain, benefit from, ignore, or foresee a current function.

rule: Use stronger intent language only when evidence crosses a named threshold.

rationale: Words such as designed, intended, engineered, negligent, emergent, repurposed, and accidental require different evidence.

rule: Preserve current function and origin as separate fields in the explanation.

rationale: This prevents current usefulness from being projected backward and prevents historical intent from obscuring current effects.

rule: Select interventions based on current causal maintenance as well as origin.

rationale: The most useful repair target may be present incentives or structure rather than original motive.

description: Observed function, original cause, and actor intent remain separate claims.

description: Attribution language is proportional to the evidence available.

description: The analysis still addresses present harms, benefits, beneficiaries, and maintainers.

description: Purpose-like language cannot substitute for a causal account of how the function is produced.

description: The clarified explanation changes investigation, redesign, governance, preservation, or accountability decisions.

description: Explanations distinguish what something does from why it arose and whether it was intended.

description: Blame, responsibility, and design credit are assigned with clearer evidence boundaries.

description: Actions target the mechanism maintaining the function rather than a guessed purpose story.

description: Teams avoid treating purpose-like effects as proof of design or motive.

description: Unintended but harmful functions remain visible as practical and ethical concerns.

prose_essence:
Function-Without-Intent Caution is the discipline of saying what something currently does without immediately claiming that someone designed it, intended it, or originally created it for that function. It is useful whenever purpose-like language is tempting: a rule “functions to exclude,” a product feature “is for surveillance,” a trait “exists for protection,” or an organizational ritual “is meant to discipline people.” Those statements may be partly right, but the archetype asks for the missing distinctions before action is taken.

The central move is simple: **observed function is not the same thing as intent**. A pattern can be useful, harmful, stabilizing, adaptive, emergent, repurposed, or maintained without having been originally designed for that role. At the same time, lack of original intent does not erase current responsibility. Once a function is visible, present-day actors may still maintain it, benefit from it, ignore it, redesign it, or mitigate it.

prose_when_to_use:
Use this archetype when people are drawing conclusions about purpose, motive, blame, or design from a current effect. It is especially helpful when a pattern has a visible function but the history is unclear, when actors disagree about whether a harmful effect was intended, or when a current function differs from the official or original rationale.

It is also useful when lack of intent is being used too broadly. The archetype does not say “no intent, no problem.” It says that original intent, current function, foreseeable harm, maintenance choices, and intervention responsibility are different claims and should be evaluated separately.

prose_structural_problem:
The structural problem is a collapsed explanation. People see that something serves a role and compress several different claims into one sentence: what it does, why it exists, who intended it, who benefits from it, and what should be done about it. That collapse produces two common errors. The first is over-attribution: assuming design or motive from function alone. The second is under-accountability: assuming that if no original intent can be proven, the current function does not matter.

This problem appears across institutions, products, organizations, ecosystems, historical interpretation, and policy. In each case, the intervention is not to ban functional language, but to scope it carefully.

prose_intervention_logic:
The intervention starts by naming the observed function descriptively. It then states the intent claim being made or implied and checks the evidence for that claim. The draft distinguishes origin from current use, maps the pathway that maintains the function, and sets an attribution boundary. Finally, it updates the explanation and links that explanation to action.

A strong output does not merely say “intended” or “unintended.” It may say: this currently functions as a barrier; it originated as a coordination rule; later decisions maintained the barrier after it became visible; there is weak evidence of original exclusionary intent but stronger evidence of present maintenance responsibility. That explanation supports a different intervention than either accusation without evidence or dismissal without repair.

prose_key_components:
- **Observed Function** (`observed_function`): describes what the pattern currently does before assigning purpose or motive.
- **Intent Evidence Check** (`intent_evidence_check`): tests whether there is evidence for design purpose, motive, foreseeable effect, or deliberate maintenance.
- **Origin-Function Distinction** (`origin_function_distinction`): separates how something began from what it currently does.
- **Current Use Map** (`current_use_map`): identifies current users, beneficiaries, maintainers, constraints, and harms.
- **Causal Pathway Context** (`causal_pathway_context`): explains how the function is produced and sustained rather than stopping at purpose-language.
- **Attribution Boundary** (`attribution_boundary`): defines what can responsibly be attributed to intent, negligence, emergence, adaptation, or current maintenance.
- **Explanation Update** (`explanation_update`): rewrites the explanation with evidence-scoped claims.
- **Intervention Implication** (`intervention_implication`): turns the clarified explanation into redesign, investigation, monitoring, repair, preservation, or accountability action.

prose_common_mechanisms:
Functional analysis is a common mechanism because it identifies what a pattern currently does. It is not the archetype by itself; without intent checking and attribution boundaries, functional analysis can still overclaim purpose.

Intent audits, design history reviews, and institutional genealogies gather evidence about origin and motive. They are useful when records, incentives, or historical decisions can clarify whether a function was deliberate, accidental, emergent, or later maintained.

Root-cause explanation reviews and current-use mapping keep the intervention practical. They prevent the analysis from becoming only a historical debate by identifying how the current function is produced and who can change it now.

Attribution checks and evidence threshold tables are lightweight implementation tools. They help teams decide when terms such as “intended,” “designed for,” “repurposed,” “emergent,” “negligently maintained,” or “accidental” are justified.

prose_failure_modes:
The most common failure mode is intentionality overreach: current function is treated as proof of design. The opposite failure mode is lack-of-intent excuse: absence of original intent is treated as absence of current responsibility. Other failures include causal underanalysis, origin fixation, false neutrality, overcorrection to accident, and mechanism confusion.

A useful mitigation is to keep two questions separate: “What can we responsibly say about intent?” and “What must we do about the current function?” These often require different evidence thresholds and timelines.

prose_neighbor_distinctions:
This archetype is closest to **Purpose Alignment Design**, but it differs sharply. Purpose Alignment Design aligns means to a known or chosen end state. Function-Without-Intent Caution asks whether a purpose can be inferred from function in the first place.

It is also near **Causal Mechanism Mapping**, but causal mapping focuses on how a cause produces an effect. This archetype focuses on the attribution error that happens when an effect is interpreted as intentional purpose. It can use causal mapping, but it is not reducible to it.

It differs from **Situational Attribution Check**, which addresses person-level behavior explanations. It differs from **Reverse Engineering**, which learns how a system works. It differs from **Historical Contextualization**, which interprets past actors in context. It differs from **Essentialism Audit**, which challenges fixed-essence claims about categories.

prose_cross_domain_examples:
In public policy, an eligibility rule may currently exclude a subgroup. The archetype separates current exclusionary function from original rationale and present maintenance choices before reforming the rule.

In product design, a feature designed for coordination may become a surveillance tool. The archetype reviews design history and current use, then redesigns controls without assuming either innocent use or malicious design from function alone.

In organizations, a recurring meeting may now function as a hierarchy ritual even if it began as a coordination practice. The intervention distinguishes official purpose, current social function, and maintenance incentives.

In biology, a trait may be described as if it were consciously designed for a role. The archetype supports describing adaptive function without implying intent.

In historical interpretation, a legacy institution may now benefit one group. The archetype separates original context, later repurposing, current beneficiaries, and evidence of deliberate maintenance before making a motive claim.

prose_non_examples: If the purpose is explicit and the task is to align activity to it, use Purpose Alignment Design. If the task is to test whether an intervention caused an outcome, use Counterfactual Comparison or Causal Mechanism Mapping. If the issue is attributing a person’s behavior to disposition rather than situation, use Situational Attribution Check. If the task is to learn the design logic of an artifact, use reverse engineering as a mechanism or neighboring archetype.

prose_tradeoffs:
The archetype trades speed for precision. It slows simple stories and may frustrate people who want immediate blame, innocence, or closure. It also requires careful communication because distinctions among origin, intent, current use, and responsibility can sound evasive if the current harm is severe.

The central tradeoff is charity versus accountability. The archetype should prevent unsupported accusation, but it should not become a shield for actors who knowingly maintain harmful functions.

prose_invariants_to_preserve: The key invariant is that function, origin, intent, and responsibility remain separate claims. The draft should also preserve evidence-scoped attribution, current-effect accountability, causal mechanism requirements, and an action link. A version of the archetype that only says “do not assume intent” is incomplete because it can erase present harm. A version that only says “current function proves intent” is also incomplete because it overreaches.

prose_target_outcomes: The target outcomes are more accurate explanations, more defensible accountability claims, better intervention targets, reduced teleological overreach, and sustained attention to current harms or benefits. When the archetype works, teams can act without pretending to know more about intent than the evidence supports.

prose_parameter_dimensions:
Important tuning dimensions include the strength of available intent evidence, the time gap between origin and current function, the severity of current harm, the degree of actor control over maintenance, the amount of documentation available, the number of beneficiaries and harmed parties, and the threshold required for stronger attribution language.

In low-stakes cases, a simple attribution check may be enough. In high-stakes governance, legal, safety, or institutional cases, the archetype should use stronger evidence thresholds, current-use mapping, and explicit separation between harm mitigation and intent attribution.

prose_variants_and_near_names:
Recognized variants include institutional function-without-intent caution, emergent function caution, and repurposed artifact caution. These variants preserve useful retrieval names without multiplying top-level archetypes.

Near names include function-intent distinction, teleological overattribution guardrail, intent inference guardrail, purpose attribution caution, and function-purpose distinction. Functional analysis and intent audit should be treated as mechanisms, not aliases for the full archetype.

short_definition: Separates an institution’s current effects from evidence about whether those effects were deliberately designed or knowingly maintained.

distinctive_feature: The focus is on inherited and maintained social arrangements where current beneficiaries and harms may differ from original rationale.

distinct_from_parent: The parent applies broadly to artifacts, organisms, institutions, and processes; this variant is specifically institutional and governance-oriented.

still_same_parent_because: It uses the same core distinction among observed function, origin, intent, and current accountability.

use_when: A policy, norm, eligibility rule, workflow, or inherited institution has a visible effect that people describe as its purpose.

use_when: The practical stakes include blame, legitimacy, reform, or accountability.

Emergent Function Caution

short_definition: Guards against treating an emergent stabilizing, adaptive, or harmful function as if it were deliberately designed from the start.

distinctive_feature: The key signal is emergence: no single actor may have designed the function, but the system may still reliably produce it.

distinct_from_parent: The parent includes any observed function; this variant emphasizes distributed causation and emergent system behavior.

still_same_parent_because: It still operates by separating current function from evidence of intention and origin.

use_when: A system-level function appears from many local interactions.

use_when: Actors are tempted to explain the system by assuming hidden design intent.

example_domains: markets organizations ecosystems platforms

Repurposed Artifact Caution

short_definition: Distinguishes an artifact’s current use from its original design purpose before drawing conclusions about design intent or misuse.

distinctive_feature: The focus is on artifacts whose current function may be downstream of appropriation, workaround, or adaptation.

distinct_from_parent: The parent is not limited to artifacts; this variant is useful for design, product, infrastructure, and technology cases.

still_same_parent_because: It still cautions that function does not prove original intent.

source_primes: teleology function

use_when: A tool, interface, feature, document, or object is being used in a way that differs from its design history.

use_when: The question is whether the current use was intended, accidental, emergent, or actively repurposed.

near_names:
Function-Intent Distinction
Teleological Overattribution Guardrail
Intent Inference Guardrail
Purpose Attribution Caution
Functional Analysis
Intent Audit