Comp. Models of the Mind III

Question 1

Three model types:

Answer 1

• Performance models (Quantitative Modeling)
• Process/Task models (Qualitative Modeling)
• Competence models (Behavioral Outcome)

Question 2

What is there to generally say about performance models?

Answer 2

• How knowledge/skills are employed in actual execution
• Statements and predictions about time, effort or likelihood of error when performing specific tasks
• focus on routine behavior in very limited applications

Question 3

What is there to generally say about process/task models?

Answer 3

• The mechanisms by which the behavior of a system is produced
• The “how”, not the “what”, e.g. learning

Question 4

What is there to generally say about competence models?

Answer 4

• What a given user knows and how this knowledge might be organized
• prediction of legal behavior sequences
• do not refer to actual execution

Question 5

One example from 1954 of a performance model:

Answer 5

Fitts’ Law

Question 6

For bullets about Fitts’ Law:

Answer 6

• information-theoretic account of simple movements
• robust model of human psychomotor behavior, based on execution time and distance
• prediction of rapid and aimed human movement
• movement time with a device (pen, mouse, …) as logarithmic function of distance and target size

Question 7

Formula for Fitts’ Law:

Answer 7

MT = a + b log₂ (D/W)

Question 8

Elements of Fitts’ Law’s Formula:

Answer 8

MT = a + b log₂ (D/W)
MT = average time to complete movement
a = device intercept (start/stop time)
b = device slope (inherent speed)
D = Distance from start point to centre of target
W = Width of target along axis of motion/error tolerance (± W/2)

Question 9

What is Meyer’s Law?

Answer 9

A refinement of Fitts’ Law for mouse movement.

Question 10

In Fitts’ law the intercept and slope is determined through …

Answer 10

… straight-line regression analysis.

Question 11

What does Fitts’ Law’s formula tell us about the performance rate?

Answer 11

Performance rate is constant over a wide range of D and W.

Question 12

What is Hick’s Law about?

Answer 12

Selection time for a set of equally probable choices (e.g. choosing btw two buttons with the same function)

Question 13

What can architecture refer to?

Answer 13

• a style and a method of design and construction (e.g. Byzantine architecture)
• orderly arrangements of parts, structure (e.g. architecture of a novel
• overall design or structure of a computer system

Question 14

5 bullets to cognitive architecture:

Answer 14

• overall structure (ontology) and arrangment of the human cognitive system
• broad theory of human cognition, based on wide selection of human experimental data, and implemented as a running computer simulation program
• embodiment of a scientific hypothesis about those aspects of human cognition that are relatively constant over time and relatively independent of task (Ritter and Young, 2001)
• more detailed machanisms and processes for specific cognitive faculties
• related basic parameters (Sun, 2008)

Question 15

What does a cognitive model consist of?

Answer 15

cognitive architecture + knowledge = cognitive model

Question 16

About process/task models:

Running the model produces …

Answer 16

… behavior sequences that can be compared to those of humans

Question 17

About process/task models:

Multiple models for any task, e.g. …

Answer 17

… different strategies

Question 18

About process/task models:

QUANTITATIVE models produce not just specific sequences/coordination, but e.g. …

Answer 18

… execution times, error rates, learning curves

Question 19

Cognitive architectures are large software systems which are …

Answer 19

… difficult to construct and maintain (done by whole teams, e.g. SOAR, ACT-R, etc)

Question 20

General requirements and desiderata for computational models of the mind:

Answer 20

• integration of cognition, perception and action
• robust behavior in the face or errors, the unexpected and the unknown
• ability to run in real time
• ability to learn
• prediciton of human behavior and performance
• management (configuration, debugging, verification)

Question 21

Who said the following about the GPS?
“It is often said … careful line must be drawn btw … machines … the same tasks that humans perform, and … machines … simulate the processes humans actually use to accomplish … tasks. …
GPS maximally confuses the two approaches - with mutual benefits.”

Answer 21

Newell & Simon, 1963

Question 22

What does GPS stand for?

Answer 22

General Problem Solver

Question 23

Define GPS!

Answer 23

An algorithm that searches for a successful solution to a problem, i.e.: a plan, given ANY well-specified search space

Question 24

What is so cool about the GPS according to Gordon (2004)?

Answer 24

“One of the hallmarks of Articifial Intelligence planning systems is the general absence of representational commitments” (Gordon, 2004)

Question 25

What does the GPS operate on and detect?

Answer 25

sentences and the differences btw sentences

Question 26

The three subgoals of the GPS according to the means-end-analysis?

Answer 26

• transform object A into object B
• reduce difference btw object A and object B
• apply operator Q to object A

Question 27

We have a GPS trace and a human protocol - what do we do?

Answer 27

We compare them!

Question 28

What can we find out, when we compare GPS traces and think-aloud studies?

Answer 28

Two aspects in which the GPS cannot simulate subject’s behavior:

• distinguishing btw internal and external world
• adequate representation of the search space

also: sequential (GPS) vs. parallel (human)

Question 29

What does the GPS reveal?

Answer 29

“that the free behavior of a reasonably intelligent human can be understood as the product of a finite and determinate set of laws.” (Newell and Simon, 1963)

Question 30

Structure of production rules?

Answer 30

if … then condition-action pairs