Lecture#05

Cognitive frameworks and Its Learning Goals

Psychology

• Psychology is the scientific study of the mind and behavior.

• Psychologists are actively involved in studying and

understanding mental processes, brain functions, and behavior.
Cognitive Psychology

• Cognitive psychologists, sometimes called brain scientists, study

how the human brain works — how we think, remember and
learn.

• Cognitive psychology is the study of human thought processes

including attention, memory, perception, decision-making,
problem-solving, and language acquisition.

• Cognitive psychologists look at how people acquire, process, and

store information
What is Cognition?

• Cognition is what goes on in out heads when we carry out our

everyday activities.

• In general, cognition refers to the processes by which we

become acquainted with things or, in other words, how we gain
knowledge.

• These include understanding, remembering, reasoning,

attending, being aware, acquiring skills and creating new ideas.
Different Kinds of Cognition
Cognition

• Cognition has also been described in terms of specific kinds of

processes.

• These include:
• Attention
• Perception and recognition
• Memory
• Learning
• Reading, speaking, and listening
• Problem solving, planning, reasoning, decision-making
Cognition

• Attention is the process of selecting things to concentrate on, at

a point in time, from the range of possibilities available.
Attention involves our auditory and/or visual senses.
• Perception refers to how information is acquired from the
environment, via the different sense organs (e.g., eyes, ears,
fingers) and transformed into experiences of objects, events,
sounds, and tastes. It is a complex process, involving other
cognitive processes such as memory, attention, and language.
Cognition

• Learning can be considered in terms of (i) how to use a

computer-based application or (ii) using a computer-based
application to understand a given topic.

• many people find listening much easier than reading. Specific

differences between the three modes include: Written language
is permanent while listening is transient. It is possible to reread
information if not understood the first time round.

• Listening requires less cognitive effort than reading or speaking

Cognition

• It is important to note that many of these cognitive processes are

interdependent: several may be involved for a given activity.

• For example, when you try to learn material for an exam, you need to
attend the material, perceive, and recognize it, read it, think about it, and
try to remember it.

• Thus cognition typically involves a range of processes. It is rare

for one to occur in isolation
Modes of Cognition

• Norman (1993) distinguishes between two general modes:

i. Experiential cognition

ii. Reflective cognition

Norman points out that both modes are essential for everyday life
but that each requires different kinds of technological support.
Experiential cognition

• It is the state of mind in which we perceive, act, and react to events

around us effectively and effortlessly.

• It requires reaching a certain level of expertise and engagement:

• Examples include driving a car, reading a book, having a

conversation, and playing a video game.
Reflective cognition

• Reflective cognition involves thinking, comparing, and decision-making.

• This kind of cognition is what leads to new ideas and creativity.

• Examples include designing, learning, and writing a book.

• Problem-solving, planning, reasoning and decision-making are all cognitive

processes involving reflective cognition. They include thinking about what to do,
what the options are, and what the consequences might be of carrying out a
given action
Experiential VS Reflective cognition

• Experiential: state-of-mind associated to perception of the

environment around us, and to our engagement with that
environment through our actions and reactions.

• Reflective: state-of-mind associated to higher-level processing of

knowledge, memory, and external information (or stimuli) through
thinking, comparing, and judging. This type of cognition is needed
for people to learn, create ideas, design products, and write books.
 COGNITIVE MODELS

• Cognitive models represent users of interactive systems.

• They model some aspect of the user’s (people) e.g. cognitive

models are, essentially, theories of how people think, how they
understand, how they process

• Cognitive models are ways of describing or predicting user

performance through a generalized representation

• Defintion “The mental action or process of acquiring knowledge and

understanding through thought, experience, and the senses”
 COGNITIVE MODELS

• These model's have the ability to represent the way a user might
think or interact.

• The common cognitive models that will be available

• Fitts' Law and Hick's law (Hick-Hyman law),
• gestalt principles,
• and the family of GOMS models.
 GOMS Model

• Many models make use of a model of mental processing in which the user
achieves
goals by solving subgoals in a divide-and-conquer fashion.

• We will consider two models:

• GOMS (Goals, Operators, Methods and Selection)
• and CCT (cognitive complexity theory)
 GOMS

• GOMS is a model of human performance and it can be used to

improve human computer interaction efficiency by eliminating
useless or unnecessary interactions.

• The level of granularity will vary based on the needs of the

analysis.
 GOMS – Example

Note: To achieve this goal we divide it into several subgoals

Goals : Shutdown a system
Operators: Press button or Click mouse etc.
Methods : X = Alt + Functions ,
Shut down,
Power Button
Selection : User will select based on his behavior.
 GOMS

• Goals: These are the user’s goals, describing what the user
wants to achieve.

• Operators: These are the lowest level of analysis. They are the
basic actions that the user must perform in order to use the
system. They may affect the system (for example, press the ‘X’
key) or only the user’s mental state (for example, read the dialog
box). ‘move mouse to menu bar, press center mouse button
- Operators are actions that are performed to reach the Goals.
 GOMS

• Methods As we have already noted, there are typically several

ways in which a goal can be split into subgoals.

• For instance, in a certain window manager a currently selected

window can be closed to an icon either by selecting the ‘CLOSE’
option from a pop-up menu, or by hitting the ‘L7’ function key.

• In GOMS these two goal decompositions are referred to as

methods, so we have the CLOSE-METHOD and the L7-METHOD:
GOMS
GOMS
• Selection rules are used if there are multiple methods, to determine how
one was selected over the others.
• For instance, a user, Sam, never uses the L7-METHOD, except for one
game, ‘blocks’, where the mouse needs to be used in the game until the
very moment the key is pressed.
• GOMS captures this in a selection rule for Sam:
User Sam:
Rule 1: Use the CLOSE-METHOD unless another rule applies.
Rule 2: If the application is ‘blocks’ use the L7-METHOD.
GOMS
• A typical GOMS analysis would therefore consist of a single high-level goal,
which is then decomposed into a sequence of unit tasks, all of which can be
further decomposed down to the level of basic operators:

GOAL: EDIT-MANUSCRIPT
GOAL: EDIT-UNIT-TASK repeat until no more unit tasks

• The goal decomposition between the overall task and the unit tasks would
involve detailed understanding of the user’s problem-solving strategies and
of the application domain.
GOMS

• Analysis of the GOMS goal structure can yield measures of

performance

• The stacking depth of a goal structure can be used to estimate

short-term memory requirements.

• The original GOMS model has served as the basis for much of
the cognitive modeling research in HCI. It was good for
describing how experts perform routine tasks.
How to Use GOMS

1. DEFINE THE USER’ TOP-LEVEL GOALS.

2. GOAL DECOMPOSITION. Break down each top-level goal into its
own subgoals.
3. DETERMINE AND DESCRIBE OPERATORS. Find out what actions are
done by the user to complete each subgoal from step 2. These are
the operators.
4. DETERMINE AND DESCRIBE METHODS. Determine the series of
operators that can be used to achieve the goal. Determine if there
are multiple methods and record them all.
5. DESCRIBE SELECTION RULES. If more than one method is found in
step 4, then the selection rules, or which method the user will
Summary GOMS

• Goals : What the user wants to achieve

• Operators: Basic actions user performs
• Methods: i. decomposition of a goals into sub-goals/ Operators
ii. Set of operators, arranged in sequence, to achieve a goal or
sub goal
iii. Sometimes, there can be more than one method to achieve a
goal.
• Selectors: means of choosing between competing methods.
Attention

• Attention is the process of selecting things to concentrate on, at

a point in time, from the range of possibilities available.

• Attention involves our auditory and/or visual senses an example

of auditory attention is waiting in the dentist’s waiting room for
our name to be called out to know when it is our time to go in.

• An example of attention involving the visual senses in scanning

the football results in a newspaper to attend to information
about how our team has done.
Types of Attention

• Four different types of attention

i. Focused Attention
ii. Sustained Attention
iii. Divided Attention
iv. Selective Attention
Focused Attention

• A short term response, which can be as short as eight seconds.

• It is tactile (feel), auditory or visual.

• If we are performing a task and our attention is shifted to some

other things just for eight seconds.
Sustained Attention

• This is the ability to focus on something for long periods of time

without being distracted

• In other words, you concentrate on time-consuming tasks by

using sustained attention.

• There are three stages of sustained attention:

• Paying Attention, When You Start To Focus
• Keeping Attention, When You Continue To Focus
• Ending Attention, When You Finally Stop Paying Attention
Sustained Attention

• Students often employ sustained attention to study for

examinations. You’ve probably used sustained attention for
activities such as attending business meetings or conferences.

• Barten dona

• The attention of a students during NTS/ KPPSC Test

Divided Attention
• When you focus on two or more things at the same time, you’re using
divided attention. You’re essentially dividing your attention between
two or more tasks. This ability is also known as multitasking.

• For example, you may have written an email while attending a webinar.

• Divided attention doesn’t last long because you split your attention
between various tasks and perform them at the same time.

• Multitasking is harmful as it affects your productivity in the long run.You

must divide your attention only when it is absolutely necessary.
Selective Attention

• Selective attention involves being able to focus on a specific task

while simultaneously being able to block out any background
noise.

• One example includes being able to read a book while there is

loud background noise around you. However, it can also refer to
not engaging with inner stimuli such as thoughts.

• It’s safe to say that if you’re good at selective attention, you’re

good at ignoring distractions and concentrating on your
priorities.