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For various reasons, cooperative aspects of work have recently gained importance in ergonomie studies. This increasing interest for cooperative features has shown the diversity and complexity of cooperative working situations. In the ergonomie literature, several terms, such as co-action, co- activity or collective activity, are defined and used to describe different modes of interindividual activity. A clarification of these concepts is necessary.
After examining cooperation and coordination notions as central to the process of cooperative activity, several characteristics or elements stemming from the literature and working situations are proposed for an analysis of cooperative work. These characteristics aim to describe the cooperative prescribed task, the cooperative effective task, cooperative activity and their mutual articulation. Three levels are analysed : organizational level, material level and process level. Relationships between characteristics inside each level and between the levels may point out work activity forms of several operators. Results on operators, performance and the work group indicate feedback effects on characteristics and levels suggested for analysis.
