Psychology and Human Factors News

Category: Graduate

Faculty Research Talk by Kevin Trewartha

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Cognitive Neuroscience of Aging

Research talk by Dr. Kevin Trewartha

Dr. Kevin Trewartha, associate professor in the Department of Cognitive and Learning Sciences (CLS) and Department of Kinesiology and Integrative Physiology (KIP), will present a talk on cognitive neuroscience of aging, Friday, April 15, 2022, at 3:00 pm, in Rekhi Hall Room G005. The lecture can also be attended virtually on Zoom. For more information on Dr. Trewartha’s research, visit his Aging Cognition Action Lab.

Dr. Hongyu An, assistant professor in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, will also present. Dr. An’s research interests include neuromorphic engineering/computing, energy-efficient neuromorphic electronic circuit design for Artificial Intelligence, emerging nanoscale device design, and spiking neural networks. Visit Dr. An’s faculty webpage.

The lecture is sponsored by the Department of Computer Science.

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BASIC Computer Tutoring Resumes at Portage Lake District Library

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From WLUC-TV6. Published March 26, 2022.

HOUGHTON, Mich. (WLUC) – Since 2018, Michigan Tech University senior Mitchell Eckstrand has come to the Portage Lake District Library to help people in Houghton with computers. It is something he has enjoyed doing almost every weekend.

“If I can do my part to help other people feel more comfortable with their devices or other tasks that they’re doing on their computer, {then} it’s rewarding for me,” said Eckstrand.

These tutoring sessions are part of BASIC, which stands for Building Adult Skills In Computing. For at least 11 years, MTU professors and students have helped community members understand technology.

MTU faculty members Charles Wallace (CS/ICC-HCC, CompEd) and Kelly Steelman (CLS/ICC-HCC) direct the volunteer program.

“Sometimes, it’s questions they don’t know about,” said Chuck Wallace, an Associate Professor of Computer Science. “Sometimes, it’s problems with existing technology. But, we take them on one-on-one and work together with them.”

Saturday, marked the first in-person session in two years.

Besides regular computers, people get help with their tablets, phones, and even Chromebooks.

“Having some Chromebooks here for people who don’t have those is a really great way for people to be able to try out some more portable technology,” said Kelly Steelman, an Associate Professor of Human Factors and Psychology. “So, they might consider whether they want to get something like that for themselves.”

The program also helps those who are anxious about asking technological questions.

“As the pace of technology progresses,” Steelman explained, “it’s more of a common discussion that everybody needs help and will need help at some point.”

Eckstrand says those he and his peers help are not the only ones who learn something new.

“A lot of times, I’ll get questions that I don’t know the answer to, and then we’ll work together to figure out the problem,” he stated. “I learn a lot of things, too that I probably would have never known had I not been involved in this program.”

The BASIC sessions will continue helping others gain technological knowledge until the end of April, before starting again in September. They are open to anyone in the community, and no sign-ups are necessary. The free sessions are on Saturdays from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. at the Portage Lake District Library’s Community Room.

Copyright 2022 WLUC. All rights reserved.

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ACSHF Forum: Grad Student Presentation

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The Department of Cognitive and Learning Sciences will host ACSHF PhD Student Shruti Amre at the next Applied Cognitive Science and Human Factors forum. The presentation, “Keep Your Hands on the Wheel: The Effect of Driver Engagement Strategies on Change Detection, Mind Wandering, and Gaze Behavior”, will be from 2:00 to 3:00 p.m. Monday (April 4) in Meese 109.

Abstract: Advanced driver-assist systems (ADAS) have revolutionized traditional driving by enabling drivers to relinquish operational control of the vehicle to automation for part of the total drive. These features only work under certain pre-defined conditions and require drivers to be attentive to their surroundings. While the features are engaged, there is an increased risk associated with drivers losing awareness of their environment. Popular manufacturers like Tesla requires drivers to have their hands-on-the-wheel while Cadillac’s ADAS requires drivers to keep their eyes-on-the road. We utilized a low-fidelity simulation and eye-tracking to examine the effects of hands-on-the-wheel and eyes-on-the-road driver engagement strategies on change detection, mind wandering, and gaze behavior in a semi-autonomous driving task.

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Graduate Research Colloquium, 2022

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Each spring, Michigan Tech’s Graduate Student Government sponsors the Graduate Research Colloquium (GRC) Poster & Presentation Competition. The GRC is a unique opportunity for current graduate students to share their research with the University community and to gain experience in presenting that research to colleagues. During this year’s GRC a virtual mock conference will be set-up where presenters are broken down into various technical sessions, ranging from Advances in Modern Medicine and Health to Power and Energy, and everything in between.

Five Applied Cognitive Science and Human Factors (ACSHF) students will be competing in this year’s event on March 29-30.

Lamia Alam

Assessing Cognitive Empathy Elements within the Context of Diagnostic AI Chatbots

Empathy is an important element for any social relationship and it is also very important in patient-physician communication for ensuring the quality of care. There are many aspects and dimensions of empathy applicable in such communication. As Artificial Intelligence is being heavily deployed in healthcare, it is critical that there is a shared understanding between patients and the AI systems if patients are directly interacting with those systems. But many of the emotional aspects of empathy may not be achievable by AI systems at present and cognitive empathy is the one that can genuinely be implemented through artificial intelligence in healthcare. We need a better understanding of the elements of cognitive empathy and how these elements can be utilized effectively. In this research, the goal was to investigate whether empathy elements actually make a difference to improve user perception of AI empathy. We developed a scale “AI Cognitive Empathy Scale (AICES)” for that purpose and conducted a study where the experimental condition had both emotional and cognitive empathy elements together. The AICES scale demonstrated reasonable consistency, reliability, and validity, and overall, empathy elements improve the perceived empathy concern within diagnostic AI chatbots.

Betsy Lehman

Easy Does It: Ease of Generating Alternative Explanations As A Mediator Of Counterfactual Reasoning In Ambiguous Social Judgments

According to sensemaking theory (Klein et al., 2007), people must first question their theory of a situation before they can shift their perspective. Questioning one’s perspective may be critical in many situations, such as taking action against climate change, improving diversity and equity at work, or promoting vaccine adoption. However, research on how people question their theories is limited. Using counterfactual theory (Roese & Olson, 1995), we examined several factors and strategies affecting this part of the sensemaking process. Eighty participants generated explanations and predicted outcomes in five ambiguous social situations. Likelihood of an alternative outcome was the measure for questioning one’s frame. Two models of the data were created. Using path analysis, we compared fit between a base model (i.e., ease, malleable factors, and missing information) and a model based on counterfactual generation theory with ease as a mediator. Results indicated that the counterfactual theory model fit was better, indicating that ease of generation may be a critical mediator in the sensemaking process. This work contributes to research focused on understanding of the mechanisms of perspective shifts to support applications for system design and training, such as programs to reduce implicit bias.

Anne Linja

Examining Explicit Rule Learning in Cognitive Tutorials: Training learners to predict machine classification

Artificial Intelligence (AI)/Machine Learning (ML) systems are becoming more commonplace and relied upon in our daily lives. Decisions made by AI/ML systems guide our lives. For example, these systems might decide whether we get a loan, and the full-self driving car we’re sharing the road with even makes decisions. However, we may not be able to predict, or even know whether, or when these systems might make a mistake. Many Explainable AI (XAI) approaches have developed algorithms to give users a glimpse of the logic a system uses to come up with its output. However, increasing the transparency alone may not help users to predict the system’s decisions even though users are aware of the underlying mechanisms. One possible approach is Cognitive Tutorials for AI (CTAI; Mueller et al., 2021), which is an experiential method used to teach conditions under which the AI/ML system will succeed or fail. One specific CTAI technique involved teaching simple rules that could be used to predict performance; this was referred to as Rule Learning. This technique aims to identify rules that can help the user learn when the AI/ML system succeeds, the system’s boundary conditions, and what types of differences change the output of the AI system. To evaluate this method, I will report on a series of experiments in which we compared different rule learning approaches to find the most effective way to train users on these systems. Using the MNIST data set, this includes showing positive and negative examples in comparison to providing explicit descriptions of rules that can be used to predict the system’s output. Results suggest that although examples help people learn the rules, tutorials that provided explicit rule learning and provided direct example-based practice with feedback led people to best predict correct and incorrect classifications of an AI/ML system.

Tauseef Ibne Mamun

Connected Crossings: Examining Human Factors in a Field Study

Poor driver decision-making continues to be a challenge at Highway-Rail Grade Crossings (HRGC). One way to improve safety has been to introduce a new, in-vehicle warning system that communicates with the external HRGC warning systems. The system gives drivers different rail-crossing-related warnings (e.g., approaching crossing, train presence) depending on the vehicle location. In a rare field study, 15 experienced drivers drove a connected vehicle (Chevy Volt) and used the warning system on a 12-mile loop, then completed a semi-structured interview and usability survey. Results from the post-drive survey and interview are reported and provide a template for future usability assessments for field studies involving new technologies.

Lauren Monroe

Don’t throw a tempo tantrum: the effects of varying music tempo on vigilance performance and effective state

Vigilance tasks, or sustained attention tasks, involve an operator monitoring an environment for infrequent and random critical signals buried among more frequent neutral signals for an extended period of time. In addition to an observable decline in task engagement, task performance, and arousal over time, these tasks are also related to an increased subjective workload. Previously, music has been shown to have a positive impact on operator engagement and reaction times during sustained attention, however the differences between fast and slow tempo music on vigilance performance and subjective mood measures have not been studied. The present study (N=50) examined the effects of music played at different tempos on a selection of performance metrics and subjective measures of mood, engagement, and workload. Results indicated that varying the tempo of music did not have an effect on the decline in the correct detection of critical signals. There also was not a significant impact on measures of arousal and stress, but the fast tempo condition had a slightly positive impact on worry and engagement from pre to post task subjective measures.

For more information on our student and faculty research see: https://www.mtu.edu/cls/research/

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Human Factors in Healthcare Keynote: Dr. Rupa Valdez presents “Creating Systems That Promote Equity: A Journey Across Disciplines”

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Please join us Friday (Mar 25) in ATDC conference room 101 (and via Zoom); talk from 3:30-4:30, with interactive discussion to follow from 4:30-5:00.

Dr. Rupa Valdez is an associate professor at the University of Virginia with joint appointments in the School of Medicine and the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences. She is also a core faculty member of Global Studies and the Disability Studies Initiative. Dr. Valdez merges the disciplines of human factors engineering, health informatics, and cultural anthropology to understand and support the ways in which people manage health at home and in the community.

We encourage faculty and graduate students with any overlap in research, interest in collaboration, or just interest in learning more about Dr. Valdez’s work/journey/activism to join us!

This event is co-sponsored by CLS, KIP, and CSA, and is sponsored in part by the Michigan Tech Visiting Professor Program, which is funded by a grant to the Office of the Provost from the State of Michigan’s King-Chavez-Parks Initiative. Michigan Technological University is an Equal Opportunity Educational Institution/Equal Opportunity Employer that provides equal opportunity for all, including protected veterans and individuals with disabilities.

Abstract:
Catalyzed by the pandemic and by the killings of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and many
others, there is rapidly growing interest in determining how we can create sociotechnical
systems that promote equity rather than perpetuate disparity and injustice. In this talk, I share
and critically reflect on my journey toward this goal over the last decade. I begin with earlier
efforts to merge approaches from cultural anthropology and engineering to inform the design
of patient-facing health information technologies. I end with more recent community-based
participatory research and policy-based efforts to reimagine public health education, accessible
healthcare, and the role of community in shaping the research process.  My engagement with
historically marginalized communities has pushed my efforts from a primary focus on creating
technologies aligned with the contexts in which such communities are embedded to a broader
focus on working with communities to shift these contexts. In concluding remarks, I reflect on
how encouraging such work requires, at minimum, embracing a broader conceptualization of
engineering and, more ambitiously, work that may be considered a-disciplinary.

BIOGRAPHY
Dr. Rupa Valdez is an associate professor at the University of Virginia with
joint appointments in the School of Medicine and the School of Engineering
and Applied Sciences. She is also a core faculty member of Global Studies and the Disability
Studies Initiative. Dr. Valdez merges the disciplines of human factors engineering, health
informatics, and cultural anthropology to understand and support the ways in which people
manage health at home and in the community. Her research and teaching focuses on
underserved populations, including populations that are racial/ethnic minorities, are of low
socioeconomic status, or are living with physical, sensory, or cognitive disabilities. Her work
draws heavily on community engagement and has been supported by the National Institutes of
Health (NIH), Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), the National Science
Foundation (NSF), and the US Department of Agriculture (USDA), among others. She recently
testified before Congress on the topic of health equity for the disability community and
received the Jack A. Kraft Innovator Award from the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society
(HFES) for her pioneering work in creating and developing the subdiscipline of patient
ergonomics.
Dr. Valdez currently serves as an Associate Editor for Ergonomics, the Journal of American
Medical Informatics Association (JAMIA) Open, and Human Factors in Healthcare. Among other
appointments, she serves on the Board of Directors for the American Association of People with
Disabilities and on PCORI’s Patient Engagement Advisory Panel. She is further the
founder and president of Blue Trunk Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to
making it easier for people with chronic health conditions, disabilities, and
age-related conditions to travel. Dr. Valdez herself lives with multiple chronic health
conditions and disabilities, which have and continue to influence her work and advocacy.

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Samantha Smith Selected for Deans’ Teaching Showcase

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Samantha Smith, assistant professor in the Department of Cognitive and Learning Sciences (CLS), is this week’s Dean’s Teaching Showcase member.

Smith will be recognized at an end-of-term event with other showcase members and is also a candidate for the CTL Instructional Award Series.

Dean David Hemmer selected Smith for her innovative course design that takes full advantage of the beautiful Keweenaw.

Smith’s new course, Nature Psychology, centers experiential learning and takes an innovative approach to helping students explore how our mental experience is connected to the natural environment. The course was selected for an IDEA Hub pilot project grant because of its innovative approach to making the subject meaningful to students and because it provides students with an interdisciplinary perspective on the subject matter by connecting them with faculty from a variety of disciplines that engage with the natural world.

Smith’s course features a significant service learning component. After a meeting with Jill Fisher, outreach coordinator from the Keweenaw Land Trust (KLT), the students have designed a pamphlet that will be placed at various KLT trailheads. The pamphlet will explain many of the ways that spending time in nature is good for mental health, physical health and cognitive performance — which should be a good way for them to share the things they are learning about in class. The class is also creating a family-oriented activity with the aim of getting more people out exploring and learning about the KLT and the land they protect.

The course culminates with a nature retreat in the Porcupine Mountains, allowing students to directly experience and reflect on concepts they’ve discussed throughout the semester. To prepare for this retreat, Smith completed an intensive five-day wilderness first responder course over the winter break.

Nature Psychology is not Smith’s first experience with experiential learning. In her Environmental Psychology class, she also takes students outside the classroom to observe psychological principles and practices at play in real-world settings. For example, she brings students on a walkability tour of Houghton and conducts a scavenger hunt at the A. E. Seaman Mineral Museum to explore the design of educational environments. Student and peer evaluations of these courses have highlighted their excellent organization and pacing through a combination of demonstrations, discussions, individual and small-group activities, and lecture.

CLS Chair Kelly Steelman says: “Since joining the department in 2019, Dr. Smith has developed a reputation as a high-quality, innovative instructor at the introductory, upper-division and graduate level … and one that excites students enough that they seek out opportunities to provide glowing feedback. In fact, last semester, I had two different students from two different classes stop me on campus to rave about her courses.”

Hemmer includes similar praise in his nomination: “Hiring faculty is one of the best parts of my job. When newer faculty like Dr. Smith quickly make such a positive impact in (and out!) of the classroom, it is truly heartening.”

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Student Spotlight: Brandon Woolman

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Brandon Woolman with Triforce at Otter River Sled Dog Training Center

This weekend, huskies and their mushers from near and far will gather in Calumet, Michigan, for the Copper Dog 150. Brandon Woolman, Michigan Tech University Applied Cognitive Science and Human Factors (ACSHF) masters student, will be among the over 50 teams registered for the event. Brandon is a member of The Mushing Club at Michigan Tech – maybe the only collegiate-level mushing organization in the nation. His role as “handler” will be to help prepare and care for a very energetic team of dogs, poised and ready to run!

Brandon gives us an insight to how he got into dog sledding, the relationship between mushers and their dogs, and what he’d like to accomplish during his time with the Mushing Club.

Tell us a bit about yourself and how you got into the sport of dog sledding?

I grew up in Waterford, Michigan and earned my undergraduate degree in cognitive neuroscience from the College of Wooster, Ohio. Two summers ago while visiting Houghton, I went to the Otter River Sled Dog Training Center with my partner Suzie Harris, who is a member of the Michigan Tech Mushing Club and current secretary. It was so cool to see all of the dogs and the workings of the kennel. Later, when I was accepted to the ACSHF masters program, I realized that I could actually participate in the Club myself and help out with the dogs.

I’ve kind of always been an outdoors person. I really enjoy the winter so I like the cold and snow. Southeast Michigan doesn’t get a ton of snow compared to up here where we’ve gotten nearly 250 inches so far this season. But I also grew up in Grayling, where my father lived, and we would do a lot of ice fishing, sledding, tubing, and snowboarding – all sorts of winter activities.

The thing that I like best about the sport of dog sledding is its friendly competitive nature – two adjectives you usually don’t hear together in describing a sport. When I started going to the races, I had never been on a sled before. I would just go and talk to all the mushers and the people involved with the races, and help out with the dogs. I also enjoy seeing the Michigan Tech team arrive at the events with so many people. Other teams might have two to four, but at the last event, Marquette’s Midnight Run, we had 20 members of the Mushing Club helping out with our three teams.

It’s always nice to hear stories from the mushers. They’re all very friendly and so are all the people who help put the races together – from the volunteers at the start, checkpoint crews along the way, and the judges. I try to talk to as many people as I can and hear their stories of past races, experiences they’ve had caring for their dogs, and learning more about their lifestyle.

The mushers definitely form a strong bond with their dogs. And the lead dogs are amazing and really smart. Until you get them leashed up and ready to go, you wouldn’t realize the strength of just one dog, and the mushers are racing with a team of 6-12, depending on the length of the race. That’s a lot of power in front of a sled.

I’ve learned that good mushers prioritize praise and positive reinforcement when training their dogs. With patience and time, they build trust with their team. Of course belly rubs, ear scratches and treats help as well. Mushers learn what motivates each dog, just like humans, they are all unique.

Do you have a mentor in the sport?

I definitely look up to Tom Bauer. He and his wife Sally are the owners of the Otter River Sled Dog Training Center and sponsor the Mushing Club. We [club members] go to their kennel and help take care of the dogs. We feed and run them and keep their spaces clean.

I’m always excited to follow Tom during a race. It’s cool when he’s out there and I get to watch where he is on a tracking system. You can actually see as his team moves through the course and encounters other racers. It also helps to estimate the location of the teams and how close they are to the next checkpoint.

As a handler, I help with the maintenance and feeding of the dogs before and during the race. At the rest points, you’ve got to take the dogs out of their houses every four hours and let them stretch their legs. It can be a lot of work when you’re staying overnight and you need to wake up at 2 or 4am. It definitely helps when you have a lot of handlers with the team, so it’s not just you. We’re all bearing through it together – negative temps and snowstorms alike. As far as dressing to stay warm, I wear Rocky boots, wool socks, lots of layers, and a good pair of Carhartts.

A highlight for me so far this year was helping run Tom’s team to the starting line at the Midnight Run. So much excitement and adrenaline ready to break loose as crowds of people watched on. It took four of us to hold the team, along with Tom pressing on the break until the countdown was complete.

How do you balance your studies and time spent with the dogs?

I try to get to the kennel at least once a week. My schedule is rather busy with coursework and research so it really depends on how things are going. Some weeks I just can’t make it, but then there are those weeks when I’m able to help out a lot. The kennel has nearly 70 dogs so any time I can give makes a difference.

Right now I’m trying to learn all the dogs by name. There are some of our Club members who know them all. Mushers have a naming system that helps in remembering which dogs are from what litter. Each litter is named after a certain category, such as Greek Gods with one named Ares, for example.

My goal before I complete my degree and leave the Mushing Club is to race as a musher for the team. But until then, I’ll enjoy being with the dogs and the people in this very interesting world of dog sledding.

–
Brandon is currently working with his advisor, Dr. Kevin Trewartha, CLS/KIP associate professor, in a research project aimed at evaluating whether subtle differences in motor behavior could serve as a sensitive marker for early cognitive impairment in Alzheimer’s disease. The project, funded by the National Institute of Health (NIH), is assessing differences in rapid motor decision making between healthy older adults and individuals with mild cognitive impairment or early stage Alzheimer’s disease.

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ACSHF Forum: Kyle Wilson, Seeing Machines

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The Applied Cognitive Science and Human Factors (ACSHF) Forum will be held from 2-3 p.m. Monday (Feb 21) virtually via Zoom. Our speaker is Kyle Wilson, Ph.D. Kyle is a Human Factors Senior Scientist and Team Lead at the company Seeing Machines in Canberra, Australia.

Title: Driver behaviors and safety risks surrounding new in-cabin technology: Three case studies from human factors research in automotive and rail environments. 
Brief Description: Dr. Wilson will discuss three human factors studies he was involved with in the transport space – each with a focus on how people experience new technology and related implications on safety and performance. He’ll cover:

  • One of the world’s first on-road automated vehicle studies with a primary focus on driver behaviour
  • Field research involving 10+ hour night shifts in the cramped cabin of a coal train
  • An on-road study evaluating safety and usability of an app that tells drivers when the traffic light is going to change

For each study he’ll discuss the goals, approach taken, findings and outcomes. Throughout, he also intends to highlight challenges and lessons learned, in what was sometimes ‘messy’ applied research.

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ACSHF Forum: Grad Student Presentations

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The Applied Cognitive Science and Human Factors (ACSHF) Forum will be held from 2-3 p.m. Monday (Feb 7) virtually via Zoom. There will be two speakers: Anne Linja and Lauren Monroe, both ACSHF graduate students.

Linja will present “Examining Explicit Rule Learning in Cognitive Tutorials: Training learners to predict machine classification“.

Abstract:
Artificial Intelligence (AI)/Machine Learning (ML) systems are becoming more commonplace and relied upon in our daily lives. Decisions made by AI/ML systems guide our lives. For example, these systems might decide whether we get a loan, what our medical diagnoses are, and the full-self driving car we’re sharing the road with even makes decisions. However, we may not be able to predict, or even know whether, or when these systems might make a mistake.

Many Explainable AI (XAI) approaches have developed algorithms to give users a glimpse of the logic a system uses to come up with its output. However, increasing the transparency alone may not help users to predict the system’s decisions even though users are aware of the underlying mechanisms.

One possible approach is Cognitive Tutorials for AI (CTAI; Mueller, Tan, Linja et al., 2021), which is an experiential method used to teach conditions under which the AI/ML system will succeed or fail. One specific CTAI technique that was proposed involved teaching simple rules that could be used to predict performance; this was referred to as Rule Learning. This technique aims to identify rules that can help the user learn when the AI/ML system succeeds, fails, the system’s boundary conditions, and what types of differences change the output of the AI system. To evaluate this method, I will report on a series of experiments in which we compared different rule learning approaches to find the most effective way to train users on these AI/ML systems. Using the MNIST data set, this includes showing positive and negative examples in comparison to providing explicit descriptions of rules that can be used to predict the system’s output. Results suggest that although examples help people learn the rules (especially examples of errors), tutorials that provided explicit rule learning and provided direct example-based practice with feedback led people to best predict correct and incorrect classifications of an AI/ML system. I will discuss approaches to developing these tutorials for image classifiers and autonomous driving systems.


Monroe will present “Don’t throw a tempo tantrum: the effects of varying music tempo on vigilance performance and affective state“.

Abstract:
Vigilance tasks, or sustained attention tasks, involve an operator monitoring an environment for infrequent and random critical signals buried among more frequent neutral signals for an extended period of time. In addition to an observable decline in task engagement, task performance, and arousal over time, these tasks are also related to an increased subjective workload. Previously, music has been shown to have a positive impact on operator engagement and reaction times during sustained attention. The present study (N=50) examined the effects of music played at different tempos on a selection of performance metrics and subjective measures of mood, engagement, and workload. Results indicated that varying the tempo of music did not have an effect on the decline in the correct detection of critical signals. There also was not an observable impact on measures of engagement and stress but the fast tempo condition had a slightly significant positive impact on worry from pre to post task subjective measures. 

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ACSHF Forum: Grad Student Presentations

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The Applied Cognitive Science and Human Factors (ACSHF) Forum will be held from 2-3 p.m. Monday (Jan. 24) virtually via Zoom.

There will be two speakers: Pomm Khaewratana and Alex Watral, both ACSHF graduate students.

Pomm Khaewratana:
Title: Learning with word game: Effects of crossword and elaboration on learning scientific vocabulary
Abstract: Crosswords have been used in a variety of science classrooms as a supplementary tool to help students learn technical vocabulary and to improve scientific thinking. However, the majority of crossword studies showed positive findings only for the former and almost none for the latter. We currently lack evidence for the usefulness of crossword in learning anything beyond the vocabulary and their definition or associated context provided as crossword hints. In this presentation, I will describe a continuation of the series of my experiments that evaluate the effect of crossword with an add-on elaboration task. The task supposedly enhances learning and retention of learned vocabulary by having learners generate sentences from technical words that depict an application-based use of the words. Fifty undergraduate students were recruited as participants in the aforementioned within-subject-design experiment. Results indicated significant improvement on memory level but not on the higher level of application.

Alex Watral:
Title: Online Assessment of Motor Learning in Younger and Older Adults
Abstract: Motor learning is a specific type of learning that occurs through repetition of a movement following the law of practice wherein rapid improvements in performance occur initially, followed by more gradual improvements as practice continues. In this sense, we can think of motor skill learning as unfolding in two phases that may rely on different cognitive mechanisms. Evidence has shown that motor learning abilities change with healthy aging such that older adults are slower to learn novel motor tasks initially while ultimately they are still able to learn to the same degree as young adults. One of the gold-standard approaches to studying motor learning is called the visuomotor rotation (VMR) paradigm. Motor learning tasks like the VMR paradigm are typically implemented in our lab using a robotic device called a Kinarm. As our understanding of motor learning evolves, we need to focus on options for testing that are more accessible than laboratory limited approaches. We have created a web-based application to assess visuomotor adaptation in a remote setting. No application downloads are required on the part of the participant. The only requirement is for them to have a computer (laptop or desktop) and an internet connection. This makes the application far more accessible than current laboratory and portable platforms. The overarching goal of this project is to validate the web-based application in younger adults as well as healthy older adults. We are also interested in verifying that previously identified correlations between the early and late stages of motor learning and implicit memory, spatial working memory, and visual-spatial abilities can be observed with this online app. Healthy younger adults (n=21) and healthy older adults (n=17) participated in this study. Each participant met with a researcher via Zoom and shared their screen while performing the VMR task and cognitive battery so that the researcher could troubleshoot as needed. Preliminary results suggest that the online application produced results similar to the laboratory task. Further analyses will be conducted to determine if there were significant differences between the two collection methods (app vs laboratory) and to see how cognitive constructs correlate with performance on the VMR app.

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