Characteristics Of Human Information Processing Research Articles

Effects of information accuracy and volume on decision making

ABSTRACTRecent advances in information technology have resulted in increasingly complex work environments. Much of the complexity is due to a deluge of information available across networks (Gleick, 2011) and unknown reliability, which introduces additional uncertainty (Platt & Huettel, 2008). Understanding the performance characteristics of human information processing for optimal decision making under such conditions of data abundance and uncertainty is critical in complex networked information environments, such as military operations. One focus of the United States military is providing troops with the richness of information formally reserved for higher echelons (Bawden & Robinson, 2009). However, this effort risks cognitive overload, where too much information can result in impaired performance. The present study examined human decision making under varying levels of cognitive load and source reliability. Participants determined the reliability of two information sources and decided how to use them to minimize cognitive load and improve performance in a visual search task. Unbeknownst to participants, one source provided highly accurate information and one provided moderately accurate information. Results showed that participants had more trust in the more accurate than the less accurate source, and decision making accuracy decreased as cognitive load increased. When cognitive load was highest, participants were more accurate on trials with the more accurate source. Thus, the more accurate source facilitated better performance, whether through better intel or through participants offloading some of the cognitive load to the reliable source.

A strong test of the dual-mode hypothesis

One account of facial cognition, the dual-mode hypothesis, maintains that there are two sources of information in a human face, featural and configural, and that these sources are processed simultaneously and independently of one another. According to the hypothesis, the processing and identification of upright faces relies primarily on configural information, and this information is disrupted to such an extent upon inversion as to result in a reliance on featural information for identifying inverted faces (e.g., Searcy & Bartlett, 1996). When considered in terms of the general characteristics of human information processing, the foundational assumptions of the dual-mode hypothesis are as follows: Facial information processing is accomplished by a parallel self-terminating architecture with unlimited capacity to supercapacity and a preservation of independence between the rates of processing of featural and configural information. Although a number of studies have provided evidence consistent with the dual-mode hypothesis, until now there have been no direct tests of the foundational assumptions of the hypothesis. The present study provides that direct test, providing strong support for three of the assumptions (parallel self-terminating processing with unlimited capacity to supercapacity) while contradicting a fourth (independence in rates).

Cognitive Strategies: a multi‐componential conception of strategy use and strategy instruction

Abstract This article argues that efficient use of cognitive strategies involves not only strategies, but domain‐specific knowledge, metacognition and motivation as well. Besides, efficient use of cognitive strategies is seen as socially mediated. It is also discussed how each of the components of the strategy system may be modified through instruction. In the final section, issues concerning cognitive strategy instruction in the classroom and component analysis of complex instructional programmes are discussed. It is concluded that a hybrid model representing a compromise between the notion of cognitive strategies and current connectionism may best capture the characteristics of human information processing.