Graphical representation in graphical dialogue

An Experimental Study of the Emergence of Human Communication Systems

“…First, participants in Study 1 solved a communication task much more open-ended than the tasks used by Healey and colleagues (Healey, Garrod, et al, 2002;Healey, Swoboda, et al, 2002). Healey and colleagues used tasks such as deciding whether or not two pieces of music participants were listening to independently were the same or not and gave participants the explicit instruction to communicate with each other.…”

“…Second, participants in Study 1 used a more restrictive medium than that used by the participants in the studies by Healey and colleagues (Healey, Garrod, et al, 2002;Healey, Swoboda, et al, 2002). Healey and colleagues used standard graphic tablets-essentially the digital equivalent of a whiteboard-with the proscription that the participants avoid using letters or numbers.…”

How to Do Experiments in Artificial Language Evolution and Why

“…But these natural experiments are generally not sufficiently controllable for being a solid basis for doing science. Quite recently some psychologists have begun to study the emergence of communication systems in dialog by constraining normal communication or creating unusual challenges (Healey P. & Katagiri, 2002). These experiments are more controlled and yield fascinating data that are highly relevant to the question of language origins.…”

Consistent practices in artifact-mediated collaboration

“…Observations of deaf children (Goldin-Meadow & Feldman, 1977;Goldin-Meadow & Mylander, 1998) documented the spontaneous development of communication systems in the absence of verbal interaction. Healey, Swoboda, Umata, and Katagiri (2002) describe a series of experiments in which participants were asked to communicate about pieces of music using only drawings but without using letters or numbers. Galantucci (2005) conducted a series of experiments in which pairs of participants were asked to play a collaborative logic game using only a severely restricted drawing tool that disallowed the use of recognizable symbol systems or complex, iconic representations.…”