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Profile before optimizing: a cognitive metrics approach to workload analysis

Published: 02 April 2005 Publication History

Abstract

The Intelligence Analyst (IA) community will soon be the designated users of many new software tools. In the multitasking world of the IA, any one tool cannot be permitted to greedily consume cognitive resources. This situation requires a new approach to usability assessment; one that profiles the moment-by-moment demands placed on embodied cognition by a given software tool during task performance. The approach we have taken relies on families of cognitive models that interleave cognition, perception, and action at the 1/3 to 3 sec timescale. This is the level of analysis where embodied cognition forms interactive routines that adapt to the cost-benefit structure of the software tool. Our proof-of-concept is a model that performs a task that the IAs find challenging. From the trace of the model, we derive a cognitive metrics profile that pinpoints dynamic changes in workload demands on human cognitive, perceptual, or action systems.

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  • (2022)Profiling cognitive workload in an unmanned vehicle control task with cognitive models and physiological metricsMilitary Psychology10.1080/08995605.2022.213067335:6(507-520)Online publication date: 21-Oct-2022
  • (2018)Cognitive Metrics Profiling: A Model-Driven Approach to Predicting and Classifying WorkloadAdvances in Human Factors in Simulation and Modeling10.1007/978-3-319-94223-0_22(236-245)Online publication date: 27-Jun-2018

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    cover image ACM Conferences
    CHI EA '05: CHI '05 Extended Abstracts on Human Factors in Computing Systems
    April 2005
    1358 pages
    ISBN:1595930027
    DOI:10.1145/1056808
    Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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    Published: 02 April 2005

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    Author Tags

    1. cognitive architectures
    2. cognitive modeling
    3. embodied cognition
    4. intelligence analysts
    5. interactive behavior

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    View all
    • (2022)Profiling cognitive workload in an unmanned vehicle control task with cognitive models and physiological metricsMilitary Psychology10.1080/08995605.2022.213067335:6(507-520)Online publication date: 21-Oct-2022
    • (2018)Cognitive Metrics Profiling: A Model-Driven Approach to Predicting and Classifying WorkloadAdvances in Human Factors in Simulation and Modeling10.1007/978-3-319-94223-0_22(236-245)Online publication date: 27-Jun-2018

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