Issues related to Technology Assessment

Whenever anyone makes a judgment about a technology, that may be called a technology assessment. In the literature, especially that generated by the US Office of Technology Assessment, the term relates to a group of types of studies that look at technological options and policy issues.
Typically, a formal technology assessment is commissioned prior to a government's or corporation's decision to choose one technological path over another. Thus, it is the aim of the team of specialists preparing the technology assessment to objectively present a short list of realistic options or alternate decisions, and to spell out their best predictions about the consequences of each option.
An environmental impact statement may be a type of technology assessment, but there are many other types as well. Technology assessments can use a variety of tools, including benefit/cost analysis, trend extrapolation, opinion measurement, simulation models, and many others.
But even the most informal technology assessment may well be concerned with collecting information, analyzing the information, developing a list of possible scenarios, forecasting, and weighing technological tradeoffs. A company that uses pneumatic and hydraulic robot may wish to commission a technology assessment or feasibility study on the upgrade to servo robots. Before lawmakers enact legislation, they often use the report of a technology assessment. On the personal level, a car buyer carefully scrutinizes a variety of choices, and often uses the same decision-making as in formal technology assessments.
The purpose of technology assessment is to objectively inform a technological decision so as to minimize unwanted outcomes and maximize desired outcomes.