A model of mental model construction

Abstract

Learning to control a computer system from limited experience with it seems to require constructing a mental model adequate to indicate the causal connections between user actions, system responses, and user goals. While many kinds of knowledge could be used in building such a model, a small number of simple, low-level heuristics is adequate to interpret some common computer interaction patterns. Designing interactions so that they fall within the scope of these heuristics may lead to easier mastery by learners.