{ "model": { "rank": 9152, "code": "thing-difficulty", "model_id": "vr.tr.difficulty", "name": "difficulty", "purpose": "the quality of being almost beyond one's ability to deal with and requiring a great effort to achieve a positive result", "family": "Thing Registry", "category": "Cross-cutting context", "status": "research-draft", "kind": "thing", "plane": "XCT", "domain": "XCT.QLT", "industry": "", "version": "", "url": "/models/thing/difficulty/", "tier": 2, "score": 48, "payload": { "layer": "wordnet", "aliases": [ "difficultness", "effortfulness", "arduousness", "strenuousness", "laboriousness", "operoseness", "toilsomeness", "asperity", "grimness", "hardship", "rigor", "rigour", "severity", "severeness", "rigorousness", "rigourousness", "sternness", "hardness", "ruggedness", "formidability", "toughness", "burdensomeness", "heaviness", "onerousness", "oppressiveness", "subtlety", "niceness", "troublesomeness", "inconvenience", "worriment", "awkwardness", "cumbersomeness", "unwieldiness", "flea bite", "fly in the ointment", "facer", "kink", "pisser", "pitfall", "booby trap" ], "aliasCount": 98, "merged": 48, "knownIn": 0, "facets": { "substance": "abstract", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "inert", "mobility": "not-applicable", "scale": "not-applicable", "affordances": [ "observable" ] }, "markers": [], "lexicalClass": "noun.attribute", "senseRank": 1, "alsoRegisteredAs": null, "source": { "dataset": "oewn:2024", "synset": "oewn-04716529-n", "ili": "i61801", "license": "CC BY 4.0" } }, "research": { "vercy": "1.0-draft", "publication": { "status": "research-draft", "adjudicationStatus": "unreviewed", "publishableCanonical": false, "generatedAt": "2026-09-12T01:22:46Z", "providers": [ "Claude" ], "breadth": "written by Claude from model knowledge without web access - no source was read, every claim is a lead to verify", "pass": 2, "wave": 2, "engine": "claude" }, "metaModel": { "id": "THING-DIFFICULTY", "registryId": "vr.tr.difficulty", "name": "difficulty", "version": "0.2.0-wave.2", "entryKind": "thing", "family": "Thing Registry", "domain": [ "XCT.QLT" ], "status": "research-draft" }, "canonicalUrl": "https://ver.cy/models/thing/difficulty/", "model": { "registry_id": "vr.tr.difficulty", "name": "difficulty", "purpose": "Let an agent explain difficulty as a quality and how it is assessed and graded, support calibrating and describing difficulty in tasks, learning and activities, present research on difficulty and learning, and separate the sense of a difficulty as a problem.", "definition": "The quality of being hard to do, understand or deal with, requiring great effort or skill, as in the difficulty of a task, problem, climb, text or situation, described by terms such as arduousness, strenuousness and laboriousness; difficulty is assessed relative to ability and resources, graded in fields such as education, sport, games and climbing, and studied in psychology and learning science, and the word also names a problem or obstacle.", "what_it_is_for": "Being hard to do or deal with.", "affordances": [ "explain the concept", "support grading difficulty", "present research", "separate other senses" ], "distinguishing_features": [ "Relational", "Graded in many fields", "Effort and skill", "Multiple senses" ], "appearance": "Not physical; a relational quality.", "visual_identification": [ "Requires great effort or skill", "Relative to ability", "Complexity is structural; a difficulty as an obstacle is another sense" ], "physical_properties": [], "families_and_kinds": [ "difficulty of tasks and problems", "difficulty levels in education and testing", "difficulty grades in sport, climbing and games", "text difficulty and readability", "difficulty as obstacle or trouble" ], "related_models": [ { "relation": "is a kind of", "target": "quality", "why": "category" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "climbing route", "why": "graded difficulty" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "experience", "why": "skill from experience" }, { "relation": "is related to", "target": "situation", "why": "difficult situations" } ], "identifiers": [], "standards_and_regulation": [ "Grading systems in sport, games and education", "Readability standards", "Test item difficulty conventions" ], "failure_modes_and_hazards": [ "Miscalibrated difficulty", "Confusing difficulty with complexity", "Discouraging learners" ], "in_scope": [], "out_of_scope": [], "characteristics": [] }, "sources": [], "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "understand", "name": "Understand", "description": "What difficulty is.", "rationale": "Concepts.", "layers": [ { "id": "concept", "name": "Concept", "description": "Concept and relativity.", "findings": [ { "id": "concept-finding", "name": "Concept", "description": "Concept.", "questions": [ { "text": "What makes something difficult, and how does difficulty depend on ability, resources and context?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "Is the quality of difficulty, or a difficulty as a problem, meant?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "terms", "name": "Terms", "description": "Related terms.", "findings": [ { "id": "terms-finding", "name": "Terms", "description": "Terms.", "questions": [ { "text": "How do difficulty, complexity, arduousness, strenuousness and laboriousness differ?", "kind": "definition" }, { "text": "How are they translated?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "grade", "name": "Grade", "description": "Grading difficulty.", "rationale": "Practice.", "layers": [ { "id": "systems", "name": "Systems", "description": "Grading systems.", "findings": [ { "id": "systems-finding", "name": "Systems", "description": "Grading.", "questions": [ { "text": "How is difficulty graded in education, testing, climbing, games and readability?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits a specific system?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] }, { "id": "calibrate", "name": "Calibrate", "description": "Calibrating difficulty.", "findings": [ { "id": "calibrate-finding", "name": "Calibrate", "description": "Calibration.", "questions": [ { "text": "How can the difficulty of this task or material be assessed and adjusted for its audience?", "kind": "action" }, { "text": "Which entry fits instructional design?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "research", "name": "Research", "description": "Difficulty and learning.", "rationale": "Science.", "layers": [ { "id": "learning", "name": "Learning", "description": "Desirable difficulty.", "findings": [ { "id": "learning-finding", "name": "Learning", "description": "Learning.", "questions": [ { "text": "What does research say about difficulty and learning, including desirable difficulties and cognitive load?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which findings are contested?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "motivation", "name": "Motivation", "description": "Difficulty and motivation.", "findings": [ { "id": "motivation-finding", "name": "Motivation", "description": "Motivation.", "questions": [ { "text": "How does perceived difficulty affect motivation, persistence and flow, according to psychology?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which entry fits motivation?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "learn", "name": "Learn", "description": "Teaching and language.", "rationale": "Education.", "layers": [ { "id": "teach", "name": "Teach", "description": "Teaching with difficulty in mind.", "findings": [ { "id": "teach-finding", "name": "Teach", "description": "Teaching.", "questions": [ { "text": "How can teachers sequence difficulty and support learners facing hard material?", "kind": "action" }, { "text": "Which misconceptions arise?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] }, { "id": "language", "name": "Language", "description": "Usage.", "findings": [ { "id": "language-finding", "name": "Language", "description": "Usage.", "questions": [ { "text": "How is difficulty used across everyday and technical language?", "kind": "provenance" }, { "text": "Which references are standard?", "kind": "provenance" } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "openQuestions": [ "Should each grading system be a separate entry?", "How should learning research be linked?", "How should readability measures be linked?" ], "statistics": { "bundles": 4, "layers": 8, "findings": 8, "questions": 16 } }, "draft": { "generator": "vr.draft.v3", "status": "draft-generated", "researched": false, "archetype": "abstract concept", "method": "Written from the archetype playbook - what this kind of thing needs beyond identity and provenance - and from the structure that recurred across 6,333 models already researched by two engines. Applied to this entry by rule. No source was read for this thing and no claim here is researched.", "facetsInferred": false, "nextPass": "A researcher replaces this draft with a sourced specification. Treat every sentence below as a proposal to argue with.", "purpose": "Give an agent a durable, checkable way to recognise a difficulty, record what state it is in, and decide what may be done with it.", "whatItIs": "the quality of being almost beyond one's ability to deal with and requiring a great effort to achieve a positive result", "characteristics": { "substance": "abstract", "origin": "conceptual", "agency": "inert" }, "whatYouCanDoWithIt": [ "observed and measured" ], "distinguishingFeatures": [ "Names folded into this entry, which a task may need to split apart again: difficultness, effortfulness, arduousness, strenuousness, laboriousness, operoseness, toilsomeness, asperity, grimness, hardship, rigor, rigour.", "48 finer distinctions are held as aliases rather than separate entries, because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it." ], "openQuestionsForResearch": [ "Which of the bundles below does a real task actually need, and which are ceremony?", "What does this thing have that the facets do not capture at all?", "Which neighbouring kind is most often confused with a difficulty, and on what evidence are they told apart?" ], "whatItIsMadeOf": "an abstraction with no physical instance", "physicalCharacter": [ "Does nothing on its own; everything it does, something else did to it." ], "whatCanBeDoneWithIt": [ "observe it, measure it, record its state" ], "howItIsRecognised": [ "Nothing to see. What is recognised is an instance of it, and which instances count is exactly what is argued about." ], "relatedModels": [ { "relation": "covers", "note": "Finer kinds folded into this entry because telling them apart needs a task that asks for it. Each is a model waiting to be split out when one does.", "targets": [ "difficultness", "effortfulness", "arduousness", "strenuousness", "laboriousness", "operoseness", "toilsomeness", "asperity", "grimness", "hardship", "rigor", "rigour" ] } ], "standing": "48 finer distinctions are held inside this entry as names rather than as separate models.", "structure": { "bundles": [ { "id": "identity-and-classification", "name": "Identity, naming and classification", "description": "How an agent tells one difficulty from another, and a difficulty from things that resemble it.", "rationale": "Recognition comes before every other claim. Without stable identity nothing else in the model can be trusted to be about the same thing twice.", "layers": [ { "id": "naming-and-identifiers", "name": "Names and identifiers", "description": "The names this thing goes by and the identifiers that survive translation and time.", "findings": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases", "name": "Preferred name, aliases and local names", "description": "Which name to use, which names mean the same thing, and which merely sound similar.", "questions": [ { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the name of a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the name of a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "preferred-name-and-aliases-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the name of a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers", "name": "Stable identifiers and external keys", "description": "Identifiers that keep pointing at this kind of thing across systems and languages.", "questions": [ { "id": "stable-identifiers-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an identifier for a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an identifier for a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stable-identifiers-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an identifier for a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "classification-and-granularity", "name": "Classification and granularity", "description": "Where a difficulty sits among kinds, and how finely a task needs to cut it.", "findings": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents", "name": "Kind, parents and neighbouring kinds", "description": "The classes this thing belongs to and the ones it is next to.", "questions": [ { "id": "kind-and-parents-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the kind of a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the kind of a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "kind-and-parents-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the kind of a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features", "name": "Distinguishing features", "description": "What separates a difficulty from the things most often confused with it.", "questions": [ { "id": "distinguishing-features-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes what distinguishes a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about what distinguishes a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "distinguishing-features-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once what distinguishes a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "state-and-lifecycle", "name": "State and lifecycle", "description": "The states a difficulty passes through and the events that move it between them.", "rationale": "Most decisions about a thing depend on what state it is in now, which is a claim with a time on it, not a property.", "layers": [ { "id": "lifecycle-stages", "name": "Lifecycle stages", "description": "From coming into existence to ceasing to be one of these.", "findings": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions", "name": "Stages and transitions", "description": "The stages worth naming and what moves a difficulty between them.", "questions": [ { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the lifecycle of a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the lifecycle of a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "stages-and-transitions-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the lifecycle of a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "observations-and-status", "name": "Observations and current status", "description": "What is observed about a difficulty, how often and by whom.", "findings": [ { "id": "observation-record", "name": "Observation record", "description": "How an observation of a difficulty is recorded so that it can be superseded rather than overwritten.", "questions": [ { "id": "observation-record-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes an observation of a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about an observation of a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "observation-record-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once an observation of a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "definitions-in-contest", "name": "Definitions and who holds them", "description": "What difficulty is taken to mean, and by whom.", "rationale": "When a field disagrees about a concept, the disagreement is the content. A model that picks one definition silently destroys the information.", "layers": [ { "id": "competing-definitions", "name": "Competing definitions", "description": "The main readings and the traditions behind them.", "findings": [ { "id": "definition-map", "name": "Definitions and their holders", "description": "Each definition with the school or body that holds it.", "questions": [ { "id": "definition-map-q01", "text": "Which definitions of difficulty are in use, and which tradition or body holds each?", "kind": "definition" }, { "id": "definition-map-q02", "text": "What turns on the difference between them in practice?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] }, { "id": "operationalisation", "name": "Operationalisation", "description": "How it is measured or applied when it has to be.", "findings": [ { "id": "operational-record", "name": "Measures and proxies", "description": "Instruments and indicators used to stand in for it.", "questions": [ { "id": "operational-record-q01", "text": "How is difficulty operationalised or measured in practice, and by what instrument?", "kind": "measurement" }, { "id": "operational-record-q02", "text": "What does that operationalisation leave out, and when does that matter?", "kind": "boundary" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "instances-and-use", "name": "Instances, use and consequence", "description": "What counts as an instance of difficulty and what follows from calling something that.", "rationale": "Applying a concept is an act with consequences, so a model must say what the label licenses and what it does not.", "layers": [ { "id": "instances", "name": "What counts as an instance", "description": "Clear cases, borderline cases and non-cases.", "findings": [ { "id": "instance-tests", "name": "Tests for an instance", "description": "What would settle whether something falls under it.", "questions": [ { "id": "instance-tests-q01", "text": "What would settle whether something is an instance of difficulty?", "kind": "boundary" }, { "id": "instance-tests-q02", "text": "Which borderline cases are argued about, and on what grounds?", "kind": "definition" } ] } ] }, { "id": "consequence", "name": "Consequence of application", "description": "Rights, duties or decisions that follow from the label.", "findings": [ { "id": "consequence-record", "name": "What the label licenses", "description": "What an agent may do once something is classified this way.", "questions": [ { "id": "consequence-record-q01", "text": "What follows practically once something is treated as difficulty?", "kind": "action" }, { "id": "consequence-record-q02", "text": "What must an agent not infer from the label alone?", "kind": "action" } ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "provenance-and-evidence", "name": "Provenance, evidence and time", "description": "Where every claim about a difficulty came from and when it held.", "rationale": "A claim without a source and a time cannot be superseded, only overwritten, and an agent that overwrites loses the ability to explain itself.", "layers": [ { "id": "source-and-authority", "name": "Source and authority", "description": "Who said it, on what evidence, and how strongly.", "findings": [ { "id": "claim-provenance", "name": "Claim provenance and confidence", "description": "The authority behind each claim about a difficulty and how confident it is.", "questions": [ { "id": "claim-provenance-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes a claim about a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about a claim about a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "claim-provenance-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once a claim about a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] }, { "id": "time-and-versions", "name": "Time, versions and supersession", "description": "When a claim was true, when it was learnt, and what replaced it.", "findings": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession", "name": "Validity period and supersession", "description": "How an old claim about a difficulty is retired without being erased.", "questions": [ { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q01", "text": "What identifies and describes the validity of a claim about a difficulty, and in what units or vocabulary?", "kind": "definition", "answer_data": [ "identifiers", "types and classes", "values with units", "explicit unknowns" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q02", "text": "Who or what asserted this about the validity of a claim about a difficulty, by which method, and when was it true?", "kind": "provenance", "answer_data": [ "authority", "method", "evidence", "event time", "knowledge time" ] }, { "id": "validity-and-supersession-q03", "text": "What may an agent decide or do once the validity of a claim about a difficulty is known, and what must it refuse?", "kind": "action", "answer_data": [ "permitted actions", "preconditions", "refusals", "escalation" ] } ] } ] } ] } ] }, "statistics": { "bundles": 5, "layers": 10, "findings": 12, "questions": 32 } } } }