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Distributed Cognition: Understanding Larger Socio-Technical Systems

This project explores the concept of distributed cognition, focusing on larger socio-technical systems rather than individual persons. The goal is to understand how cognitive properties emerge at a system level and cannot be reduced to individual cognitive processes. The project examines various representations, such as long multiplication and the Tower of Hanoi problem, to analyze what makes a representation "good" and how it captures important features while removing irrelevant details. The project also considers the role of theory in Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) and the importance of understanding distance in socio-technical systems.

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Distributed Cognition: Understanding Larger Socio-Technical Systems

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  1. Distributed Cognition Jeffrey Heer · 29 April 2009

  2. Project Abstracts • For final version (due online Fri 5/1 @ 7am) • Flesh out concrete details. What will you build? If running an experiment, what factors will you vary and what will you measure? What are your hypotheses and why? Provide rationale! • Need to add study recruitment plan and related work sections (see http://cs376/project.html). • ~8-9 paragraphs addressing required topics. • Iterate more than once! Email to discuss.

  3. In-Class Exercise I need three volunteers. (No mathematical savants.)

  4. Solve Multiplication Problems Contestant 1 • Use long multiplication, with pen and paper Contestant 2 • Use the Feynman Problem Solving Algorithm • (1) Write down the problem • (2) Think very hard • (3) Write down the answer

  5. 102 x 45 510 4080 4590

  6. 34 x 72 68 2380 2448

  7. Multiplication 34 x 72 68 2380 2448

  8. Zhang & Norman, The Representation of Numbers

  9. What makes a representation “good”? Capture important features Remove irrelevant details Provide external memory Replace computation with perception Appropriate to task

  10. Tower of Hanoi Goal: Move stack to pole 3. Only one at a time. Top piece only. Smaller above larger.

  11. Distributed Cognition The classical cognitive science approach can be applied with little modification to a unit of analysis that is larger than an individual person. One can still ask the same questions of a larger socio-technical system that one would ask of the individual. - Hutchins 1995

  12. Distributed Cognition … many of the representations can be observed directly, so in some respects, this may be a much easier task than trying to determine the processes internal to the individual… Posing these questions in this way reveals how systems that are larger than an individual may have cognitive properties in their own right that cannot be reduced to the cognitive properties of individual persons. - Hutchins 1995

  13. What is the role of theory in HCI?

  14. What Still Matters about Distance? Gary and Judy Olson CS 547 HCI Seminar Friday 12-2pm, Gates B1

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