CS295J/Literature class 3.11

• Now Where Was I? Psychologically-Triggered Bookmarking, Pan et al., CHI '11

Presents an interaction paradigm for implicitly bookmarking application progress/media during user interruptions (e.g., phone ringing) using galvanic skin response (GSR) to identify interruptions, or the orienting response (OR), automatically. The authors evaluate how well GSR works for identifying user ORs, and describe a few experiments using an audiobook listener application that creates bookmarks (stored and represented in a GUI) automatically when GSR peaks in response to controlled stimuli. In our project, we're looking at predicting user states (or effect on task performance), so this is an example of that kind of predictive affect-tracking that has been engineered into a usability feature. (Owner: Steven Gomez, Discussant: Wenjun Wang, Discussant: Nathan)

• Data Visualization Optimization Computational Modeling of Perception Ware-2011-TVCG

In this paper, the author applies perceptual theory to visualization through computational modeling. A computational model has been implemented to generate 2D flow visualization, and the visualization is iteratively optimized. The model is an artificial neural network. It's first layer corresponds to the visualization image, the second layer to the human retina, and the third to the V1 region in the human vision system. The optimization criteria is that " the user's perception of the visual variables should closely matches to the data being expressed". The paper shows that this kind of computational models have three advantages: 1. It directly links improvement of visualization quality to advancement in understanding of human vision system; 2. It enables discovery of good visualization that the designer may not come up with otherwise; 3. The evaluation of the generated visualization can be readily adapted from the equations used in the optimization process, and can be automated. I think this is a unique and quantitative example of how cognition can be applied to visualization. (Owner: Hua, Discussant: Diem Tran, Discussant: Jenna Zeigen Sep.19, 2011)

• Synchronous interaction among hundreds: an evaluation of a conference in an avatar-based virtual environmentCHI-2011

This paper presents the first in-depth evaluation of a large multi-format virtual conference. The conference took place in an avatar-based 3D virtual world with spatialized audio, and had keynote, poster and social sessions. (Owner:Wenjun Wang,Discussant:Chen, Discussant:?)

• Brainframe: A Knowledge Visualization System for the Neurosciences Shaw-2009-KVS

This paper begins with a brief overview of a problem plaguing the field of neuroscience today– namely, that there is so much data available that it can't be synthesized in a useful way by researchers– and the negative effects that arise as a result. The authors propose BrainFrame, a "knowledge management system," designed to streamline this massive amount of data into a formal set of concepts that can be organized semantically. Although BrainFrame is not explicitly a visualization system, this paper is highly relevant to our course on several levels. It shares a common focus of subject matter in neuroscience data management, it emphasizes ease of use based on human cognitive limitations, and it provides several guidelines for the construction of other similar knowledge management systems, based on existing examples. (Owner: Michael Spector, Discussant: Diem Tran, Discussant: Clara Kliman-Silver)

• The Challenge of Information Visualization Evaluation Plaisant-2004-CVE

The paper describes current evaluation practices being used in visualization research and challenges researchers are facing:

1. Most evaluations are done in lab settings, which may be different from real environments.
2. Evaluations usually include only simple tasks, while users in different cases may use tasks with various complexity.
3. Users may need to look at the data they examining from different prespectives, which makes it difficult to evaluate success of the tools.
4. Current evaluations cannot quantify the risks related to errors/failure of the tools, or benefits and chances to explore new phenomenom of data.

The paper then describes a contest run to examine the use of benchmark datasets and tasks, the outcome shows that it is very difficult to fully evaluate an analysis tools given the benchmark, due to the complexity of the problem.

The paper ends with some case studies of successful analysis tools.

(Owner: Diem Tran, Discussant: Steven Gomez, Discussant: Chen)

• Design and Evaluation of a Mobile Art Guide on iPod Touch

This paper evaluates the design principles behind an iPod app with respect to minimizing cognitive load and maximizing usability, without sacrificing the artistic and historical information the app is supposed to provide. With these constraints in mind, the authors identify navigation techniques, graphics, and balance of information and technical architecture as key aspects of their design. Trade-offs between HCI technology and cognitive load are discussed, particularly when striking a balance between graphics and text. (Owner: Clara Kliman-Silver, Discussant: Jenna Zeigen, Discussant: ?)

• On Distinguishing Epistemic from Pragmatic Action Kirsh and Maglio

This is an interesting paper for the theory of interaction. A common assumption in visualization user models is that the purpose of interaction is always to affect the state of a program. However, the authors make the argument that some interactions make more sense as techniques to make reasoning more efficient. They study players in a game of Tetris and find a high number of interactions that are not goal-directed, but which might orient the game pieces to help the user envision where they fit. Since visualization is all about understanding a data space, and goals are often open-ended, this kind of "epistemic action" may be an important part of our user models. (Owner: Caroline Ziemkiewicz, Discussion: Hua, Discussant: ?)

• Attention, Habituation and Conditioning: Toward a Computational Model Balkenius-2000-AHC

Summary

• "The central claim of this article is that attention can be controlled in the same way as actions using similar learning mechanisms and by related areas of the brain."
• "A computational model of attention is presented that uses habituation as well as classical and instrumental conditioning to explain a number of attentional processes."
• "Computer simulations are presented that illustrates the operation of the model."

Relevance

• Model of attention may have some predictive capabilities (i.e., might be able to use it to predict people's attention)
• Can use conditioning methods to train users to focus attention on important parts of the visualization (assuming we know what these important parts are)

(Owner: Nathan Malkin, Discussant: Hua, Discussant: ?)

• Computational Model of Facial Attractiveness Judgements Bronstad-2008-CMF

Talk about the computational models of facial attractiveness judgements, one model uses partial least squares to identify facial images and attractive ratings, the second model uses manually derived measures of facial features as input. Results are discussed. The paper also concludes that averageness and sexual dimorphism are important for facial attractiveness judgements.(Owner: Chen, Discussant: Clara, Discussant: ?)

• Interactive Visualization of Small World Graphs van Ham-2004-IVS

The brain can be considered to be a small world type network, and such networks are considered difficult to effectively visualize because of their high connectivity. This paper discusses specific ways the authors have found to make such visualizations detailed enough to convey enough information but abstracted and simple enough that they are easy to interact with. Specifically, they suggest use of a fish-eye distortions, different focuses based on distances to the section being examined, clusters of spherical nodes, and edge drawing conditional on length. (Owner: Jenna Zeigen; Discussant: Steven Gomez; Discussant: ?)

• Knowledge Visualization: Towards a New Discipline and Its Fields of Applications Describes the process of visualing knowledge as opposed to simply information. This paper proposes the idea and presents recent research on the subject. Several examples are presented of different types of visualizations. They begin to make the case about non-2d graphical visualization and interactive methods. (Owner: Stephen Brawner, 21 September 2011, Discussant:? Discussant?)