Cognitive Factors in Programming with Diagrams

  • Authors:

  • Alan F. Blackwell;Kirsten N. Whitley;Judith Good;Marian Petre

  • Affiliations:

  • Computer Laboratory, University of Cambridge. Cambridge, U.K. (E-mail: alan.blackwell@cl.cam.ac.uk);Department of Computer Science, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee, U.S.A. (E-mail: whitley@computer.org);Human Communication Research Centre, University of Edinburgh (E-mail: judithg@cogsci.ed.ac.uk);Centre for Informatics Education Research, Faculty of Mathematics and Computing, Open University, Milton Keynes, U.K. (E-mail: m.petre@open.ac.uk)

  • Venue:
  • Artificial Intelligence Review
  • Year:
  • 2001

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Abstract

Visual programming languages aim to broaden the use ofdiagrams within the software industry, to the extentthat they are integrated into the programming languageitself. As a result, they provide an ideal opportunityto study the benefits of diagrams as an externalrepresentation during problem solving: not only isprogramming a challenging problem-solving activity,but the effect of diagram usage can be directlyassessed by comparing performance while using a visualprogramming language to performance with a standardtextual language. There have been severalmisconceptions amongst visual language researchersregarding the role of diagrams in software design, butthese are being addressed by empirical studies and bynew theories of notation design derived from studiesof visual programming. Based on this research, theauthors are able to recommend several new directionsfor research into thinking with diagrams.