Cognitive Computing A research blog by Ashwin Ram, PhD

We believe that identifying media by their cognitive roles (e.g., definition, explanation, pseudo-code, visualization) can improve comprehension and usability in hypermedia systems designed for learning. We refer to media links organized around their cognitive role as cognitive media types (Recker, Ram, Shikano, Li, & Stasko, 1995). Our hypothesis is that the goals that students bring to the learning task will affect how they will use the hypermedia support system (Ram & Leake, 1995).

We explored student use of a hypermedia system based on cognitive media types where students performed different orienting tasks: undirected, browsing in order to answer specific questions, problem-solving, and problem-solving with prompted self-explanations. We found significant differences in use behavior between problem-solving and browsing students, though no learning differences.

Read the paper:

The Role of Student Tasks in Accessing Cognitive Media Types

by Mike Byrne, Mark Guzdial, Preetha Ram, Rich Catrambone, Ashwin Ram, John Stasko, Gordon Shippey, Florian Albrecht

www.cc.gatech.edu/faculty/ashwin/papers/er-96-03.pdf