Computer Science

Colloquium Details

The low-level cognitive processes involved in the visual search of pull-down menus and computer screens, as revealed by cognitive modeling

Abstract

The field of human-computer interaction does not have an empirically validated model of the low-level perceptual, cognitive, and motor processes that people use when they look for an item on a computer screen. In this dissertation, I provide such a model by (1) building computational cognitive models that simulate people accomplishing visual search tasks such as finding an item on a pull-down menu; (2) validating the models by demonstrating that they can accurately predict how much time people require to accomplish the same visual search tasks; and (3) providing the field of human-computer interaction with some specific practical benefit from these models, including explanations of how screen layout design guidelines affect the cognitive processes involved in visual search.