In order to understand diagrammatic reasoning with multiple diagrams, this study proposes a theoretical framework that focuses on the cognitive processes of perceptual and conceptual integration. The perceptual integration process involves establishing the interdependence between the relevant system elements that have been dispersed across multiple diagrams, while the conceptual integration process involves generating and refining hypotheses about the system by combining the higher level information inferred from the diagrams.This study applies the diagrammatic reasoning framework of a single diagram to assess the usability of multiple diagrams as an integral part of a system development methodology. We conducted an experiment that evaluated the effectiveness and the usability of design guidelines to aid problem solving with multiple diagrams. The results of the experimental study reveal that understanding a system represented by multiple diagrams involves a process of searching for related information and of developing hypotheses about the target system. The results also showed that these perceptual and conceptual integration processes were facilitated by incorporating visual cues and contextual information in the multiple diagrams as representation aids. Visual cues indicate which elements in one diagram are related to elements in other diagrams, and the contextual information indicates how the individual datum in one diagram is related to the overall hypothesis about the entire system. processes are involved in reasoning with diagrammatic representations (Larkin and Simon, 1987). Some studies have investigated issues arising from the use of multiple diagram (e.g., McDonald and Stevenson, 1996), but these studies have used multiple displays of the same type of diagram, each showing a small portion of the whole target (Woods and Watts, 1997). However, issues concerning the coordination of multiple diagrams of different usage, the integration of information dispersed across multiple diagrams from different perspectives, or the information extraction problem from multiple diagrams of different types have not been adequately addressed (Woods, 1995). The lack of studies in using multiple diagrams is particularly detrimental to the success of business engineering, because thorough understanding of the complex business system requires the integration of information across multiple views where each view is a diagram from a different perspective or at a different level of abstraction. Moreover, most business engineering projects require a greater number of diagrams than other system analysis projects, because business engineers need to understand and design both the business processes and the information systems to support these processes (Jacobson, 1995;Taylor, 1995).The objective of this study is to explore the cognitive processes in understanding multiple diagrams representing complex systems. This objective is pursued by 1) extending research on a single diagram to multiple diagrams to propose a theoretical framewor...
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.