Week 8 Cognitive Frameworks & Processes Flashcards
Cognition
Cognition includes all of the conscious and
unconscious processes involved in
perceiving, thinking, reasoning, and responding.
Cognition has two branches. What are they?
Frameworks & Processes
Cognitive Frameworks
Information processingmodel
Distributed cognition
External cognition
Information Processing Model
- Conceptualizes human performance in metaphorical terms
of information processing stages
Information Processing Model (Late 1970s)
- Assumptions:
- Information is unidirectional and sequential
- Each stages takes a certain amount of time
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What is missing from this model?
Information Processing Model (Extended, Barber 1988)
- Focus:
- How information is perceived by the perceptual processors
- How that information is attended
- How that information is processed and stored in memory
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What is missing from this model still?
Distributed Cognition
Distributed Cognition (Look at image on slides)
- Distributed problem solving
- Verbal and nonverbal behavior
- Communication in collaborative activities
- Sharing and accessing knowledge
- Coordinating mechanisms used (e.g. rules, procedures)
Traditional vs. Distributed Cognition(Look at image on slides)
Traditional: Inputs, Then person processes, then outputs
Distributed: Inputs cause different processes and lead to different combinations of other inputs and repetition of processing, leading to an output
Distributed Cognition - Examples
Pilot, Captain, and Air Traffic controller working together (Meaning whatever one of them does something the others have to respond accordingly)
Work place??
Airport
External Cognition (Look at image on slides)
Explains how users interact with external representations (e.g., maps, notes, diagrams)
* What are the cognitive benefits?
* Which cognitive processes are involved?
* How do they extend our cognition?
* Which computer-based representations can we develop to help?
Three Main Benefits of External Cognition
Externalizing to reduce memory load
Computational offloading
Annotation and cognitive tracing
- Externalizing to Reduce Memory Load
Use external representations to:
Remind us that we need to do something
* Buy cake for mother’s day
Remind us of what to do
* Buy a card
Remind us when to do something
* Send a card by a certain date
Remind us about events in the past
* Recall what happened on your graduation day
Information that is difficult to remember:
Phone numbers
Addresses
Personal contacts
Birthdays
Appointments
- Computational Offloading
Using a tool in conjunction with an external representation to carry
out a computation, e.g.:
* Pen & paper
* Calculator
Try doing the two products: of very large numbers
Ex: Calculators allow you to offload the thinking process
- Annotation and Cognitive Tracing
Annotation: modifying existing representations by creating marks
* Crossing off
* Ticking
* Underlining
* Highlighting
Cognitive tracing
* Manipulation of external
representations to form
new information
Cognitive tracing: e.g.
* Playing scrabble
* MS Word Review tool
* GitHub version control system
External Cognition - Design Implications
Understand how key cognitive
functions affect the way users
interact with UI
* E.g., perception and attention
* Reasoning and memory
Provide external representations
at the interface
* Reduces memory load
* Facilitates computational offloading
* E.g., information visualizations
* Calendar, contacts, annotations
Users are able to do more and
think more
* efficiently
Cognitive Processes (PeT-MALL)
Perception
Thought
Memory
Attention
Learning
Language
Attention: The “Gateway”
And
List the 3 types (SDC)
A filter in the brain:
* Focus on certain things…
* while ignoring the rest.
Three types (SDC):
* Selective: choose one thing to focus on
(endogenous control)
* Divided: focus on more than one thing simultaneously
* Captured: attention is ‘demanded’ externally (exogenous control)
Selective Attention (6)
Pick one thing to focus on
* amongst many possibilities
Voluntary
* under control of the observer
Eye movement to item of interest
Head movement to sounds of interest
Cocktail party effect:
* Ability to “tune out” numerous conversations
in same vicinity and focus on just one
Single “locus of attention”
Divided Attention
Multiple tasks take place:
* “simultaneous” or time
multiplexed (rapidly alternate)
Can degrade performance:
* if combined tasks
exceed human abilities
Interference between tasks
Cognitive Resource Sharing
Watching TV and Doing Homework
What resources are being shared? (Mental???)
To my understanding, spliting cognative resources between simultaious tasks. Basically multi tasking
Captured Attention
Reflexive, exogenous (external)
Attention automatically drawn to a stimulus
* caused by sudden change in the periphery
Under control of the stimulus
Examples
* A loud noise
* A blinking light
* Something moving
* E.g., in UI design?
Design Implications for Attention
Make information noticeable when it needs attention
Avoid cluttering the interface with too many competing elements
Information in the interface should be structured to manage users’ attention:
* Use perceptual boundaries,
color, sound and movement
Perception and Cognition
“How informationis acquired from the world and transformed into
experiences. Different senses involved, with visual being dominant.”
Foveal vs. Peripheral Vision
Visual Field: approx. 135 degrees
Foveal Vision Field:
* strong acuity
* for color vision
* approx. 2-degree field
Peripheral Vision Field:
* Poor acuity, color blind
* Strong motion detection
