[en] Analyses of nuclear power plant annunciator systems have uncovered a variety of problems. Many of these problems stem from the fact that the underlying philosophy of annunciator systems have never been elucidated so as to impact the initial annunciator system design. This research determined that the basic philosophy of an annunciator system should be to minimize the potential for system and process deviations to develop into significant hazards. In order to do this the annunciator system should alert the operators to the fact that a system or process deviation exists, inform the operators as to the priority and nature of the deviation, guide the operators' initial responses to the deviation, and confirm whether operators responses corrected the deviation. Annunciator design features were analyzed to determine to what degree they helped the system meet the functional criteria, the priority for implementing specific design features, and the cost and ease of implementing specific design features