Boxes And Arrows : The Design Behind the Design

Article Idea:

RE: to Mental Modeling 101

suggested by Matt Queen on 2006/02/08

In response to this suggestion, “Suggestion: How To: Mental Model Diagramming 101” I would like to write a How To based on the approach I have developed for eliciting and mapping user mental models. The process is roughly as follows:

Discrimination: Conduct an interview that aims to elicit what salient “parts” or components the user defines in the system or process. Ex. The publishing process is composed of a writer, editor, publisher, publication, and manuscript.

Articulation: Next, prompt the user to elaborate on and characterize each of these salient parts.

Organization: Then, have the user organize these parts in a functional manner (i.e. what happens first, second, third, etc.)

Simulation: Finally, ask the user to describe an actual instance where this functional architecture was evident.

This technique is based on Norman’s early (1986) work about how users of a system form mental models. Walking users through the formation process leads to highly articulated models which can be richly validated through the evidenced “simulation” stage. Additionally, this process makes explicit the relationships between salient parts allowing for direct mapping to diagrams. There are also various validation techniques involving the observation of user study sessions.

I use these techniques often in my work as well in the classes I teach (HCI in the college of Engineering at the University of Washington). A sample of my writing style and approach to HCI and interface design can be seen in my article “Interaction Modeling and User State Trace Analysis,” written for B&A.

Best,

Matt Queen

Human-Computer Interaction Research
Synergia LLC
queen@synergia.com