Quantitative Pedagogy: A Digital Two Player Game to Examine Communicative Competence
Matías Lopez-Rosenfeld1,2, Facundo Carrillo1, Gerry Garbulsky3
1Laboratorio de Inteligencia Artificial Aplicada, Departamento de Computación, Facultad de Ciencias Exactas y Naturales, Universidad de Buenos Aires, Pabellón 1, Ciudad Universitaria, 1428 Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Plos One
|November 12, 2015
Summary
Clear communication relies on coherent and procedural descriptions. This study found that creativity and metaphors do not improve the accuracy of conveying conceptual knowledge, unlike structured language.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Science
- Educational Technology
- Human-Computer Interaction
Background:
- Conceptual knowledge is complex and often richer than its linguistic representation.
- Effective communication strategies for transferring complex ideas are not fully understood.
- Pedagogical methods require quantitative analysis to optimize knowledge transfer.
Purpose of the Study:
- To identify the most effective attributes of descriptions for accurately conveying conceptual knowledge.
- To quantitatively analyze factors influencing communication precision in a controlled setting.
- To investigate the impact of description characteristics on the faithful replication of visual information.
Main Methods:
- A two-player game, inspired by Chinese Whispers, was developed to simulate knowledge transfer.
- Participants (emitter and receiver) engaged in a drawing-description task using a custom android application.
- Vast datasets were collected to quantify the relationship between description attributes and communication fidelity.
Main Results:
- Descriptions that are coherent and procedural significantly enhance the accurate communication of visual information.
- The use of creative language, metaphors, or mathematical concepts in descriptions did not improve communication fidelity.
- Quantitative analysis revealed specific linguistic features that correlate with precise image conveyance.
Conclusions:
- Coherence and procedurality are key attributes for effective conceptual knowledge transfer.
- Linguistic richness, such as creativity or metaphors, does not guarantee improved understanding or accuracy.
- The study provides empirical evidence for optimizing communication strategies in educational and technical contexts.
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