At 02:10 -0400 4/14/98, Pamela McGillivray wrote:
>As part of a study program I am involved in, I have been asked to present
>on the topic of Mental Models and their significance to HCI (Human
>Computer Interaction, also known as Human Factors). I'm interested in
>what others think about mental models, and my emerging understandings as
>described below.
To consider a *context* for HCI you should see "Complexity and Creativity
in Organizations", Ralph Stacey, Berrett-Koehler 1996. It mentions mental
models, but I understand they are not important for the overall premise.
Theory from situated cognition and ecological psychology rejects the idea
of mental models (as schemata or representations, or the "information
processing" model of mind) and views perception - conception - action as a
dynamic interpretation and reconstruction. See, for example:
"Catching ourselves in the Act: Situated Activity, Interactive Emergence,
Evolution, and Human Thought", Horst Hendriks-Jansen, MIT Press 1996.
"Situated Cognition: On Human Knowledge and Computer Representations",
William Clancey, Cambridge University Press, 1997.
These have some important implications for HCI such as the need to provide
rich cues for information pickup, and landmarks for navigation rather than
assuming that the user constructs a stored mental map. Just because we
write descriptions, draw maps, and tell stories, doesn't mean that inside
our minds there are recordings to be played. That misconception leads some
teachers to think that learning consists of implanting procedures and
facts which are then "executed" by the mental wetware. Using the "mental
model" metaphor can lead to some wrong ideas about human agency.
Regards,
John Hanna
--John Hanna <jh@hanna.connix.com>
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