Core Area: Analytic Methods
We think a lot about thinking, and we design software and methods that guide our users in exploring and drawing valuable insight from visual representations. We help people use visualizations to create and test hypotheses, communicate results, and challenge assumptions.
Research Topics and Products
Active Products
Active Products are a new kind of “smart report” that can support both rapid authoring and new modes of presentation. Instead of static reports that are difficult to update and that must be composed manually, Active Products are context-sensitive, automatically taking the form appropriate for their audience.
NVAC’s Active Products research is developing a suite of tools that supports the end-to-end process of information product authoring and dissemination. This tool suite includes components in three areas: analytic snippet collection, report composition, and dynamic presentation.
Active Products introduce new reporting paradigms, allowing user communities to move beyond static reports to dynamic products tightly coupled to data and reasoning.
SATkit - Structured Analytic Techniques
SATkit is a suite of wiki-based tools that enables analysts to use analytical techniques that facilitate critical thinking and reduce bias. The toolkit includes Analysis of Competing Hypotheses (ACH), Key Assumptions Check, and Multi-Attribute Utility Analysis. These tools can be used by individual analysts or collaboratively in groups. SATKit tools are written as Java widgets that store their data on the wiki, which allows them to be embedded on wiki pages.
Analytic Widgets
Analytic widgets are individual, web browser-based visualizations from the IN-SPIRE suite. Each is a gateway into visualizing and interacting with data. Widgets are simplified interfaces to the same data analysts explore would explore in more complex applications. Although simple in appearance, they provide rich insight into data, and are also useful for gaining an overview of a dataset before digging deeper in a full visual analytics application.
Related Papers
Show all abstractsA Multi-Phase Network Situational Awareness Cognitive Task Analysis
Erbacher R, DA Frincke, PC Wong, S Moody, and GA Fink. 2010. A Multi-Phase Network Situational Awareness Cognitive Task Analysis. Information Visualization 9(3):204-219.
Abstract
The goal of our project is to create a set of next-generation cyber situational-awareness capabilities with applications to other domains in the long term. The objective is to improve the decision-making process to enable decision makers to choose better actions. To this end, we put extensive effort into making certain that we had feedback from network analysts and managers and understand what their genuine needs are. This article discusses the cognitive task-analysis methodology that we followed to acquire feedback from the analysts. This article also provides the details we acquired from the analysts on their processes, goals, concerns, the data and metadata that they analyze. Finally, we describe the generation of a novel task-flow diagram representing the activities of the target user base.
Cognitive Task Analysis of Network Analysts and Managers for Network Situational Awareness
Erbacher R, DA Frincke, PC Wong, S Moody, and GA Fink. 2010. Cognitive Task Analysis of Network Analysts and Managers for Network Situational Awareness. In Proceedings of the SPIE: Visualization and Data Analysis 2010, vol. 7530, ed. J Park, MC Hao, PC Wong and C Chen, p. Art No.: 75300H. SPIE, Bellingham, WA. doi:10.1117/12.845488
Abstract
The goal of the project was to create a set of next generation cyber situational awareness capabilities with applications to other domains in the long term. The goal is to improve the decision making process such that decision makers can choose better actions. To this end, we put extensive effort into ensuring we had feedback from network analysts and managers and understood what their needs truly were. Consequently, this is the focus of this portion of the research. This paper discusses the methodology we followed to acquire this feedback from the analysts, namely a cognitive task analysis. Additionally, this paper provides the details we acquired from the analysts. This essentially provides details on their processes, goals, concerns, the data and meta-data they analyze, etc. A final result we describe is the generation of a task-flow diagram.
Designing a Collaborative Visual Analytics Tool for Social and Technological Change Prediction.
Wong PC, LYR Leung, N Lu, MJ Scott, PS Mackey, HP Foote, J Correia, Jr, ZT Taylor, J Xu, SD Unwin, and AP Sanfilippo. 2009. Designing a Collaborative Visual Analytics Tool for Social and Technological Change Prediction. IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications 29(5):58-68.
Abstract
We describe our ongoing efforts to design and develop a collaborative visual analytics tool to interactively model social and technological change of our society in a future setting. The work involves an interdisciplinary team of scientists from atmospheric physics, electrical engineering, building engineering, social sciences, economics, public policy, and national security. The goal of the collaborative tool is to predict the impact of global climate change on the U.S. power grids and its implications for society and national security. These future scenarios provide critical assessment and information necessary for policymakers and stakeholders to help formulate a coherent, unified strategy toward shaping a safe and secure society. The paper introduces the problem background and related work, explains the motivation and rationale behind our design approach, presents our collaborative visual analytics tool and usage examples, and finally shares the development challenge and lessons learned from our investigation.
Application and Evaluation of Analytic Gaming
Riensche RM, LM Martucci, J Scholtz, and MA Whiting. 2009. Application and Evaluation of Analytic Gaming. In 2009 International Conference on Computational Science and Engineering, August 29-31, 2009, Vancouver, Canada, 4:1169-1173. IEEE Computer Society, Los Alamitos, CA.
Abstract
We describe an "analytic gaming" framework and methodology, and introduce formal methods for evaluation of the analytic gaming process. This process involves conception, development, and playing of games that are informed by predictive models and driven by players. Evaluation of analytic gaming examines both the process of game development and the results of game play exercises.
The Science of Interaction
Pike WA, JT Stasko, R Chang, and T O'Connell. 2009. The Science of Interaction. Information Visualization 8(4):263-274.
Abstract
There is a growing recognition with the visual analytics community that interaction and inquiry are inextricable. It is through the interactive manipulation of a visual interface - the analytic discourse - that knowledge is constructed, tested, refined, and shared. This paper reflects on the interaction challenges raised in the original visual analytics research and development agenda and further explores the relationship between interaction and cognition. It identifies recent exemplars of visual analytics research that have made substantive progress toward the goals of a true science of interaction, which must include theories and testable premises about the most appropriate mechanisms for human-information interaction. Six areas for further work are highlighted as those among the highest priorities for the next five years of visual analytics research: ubiquitous, embodied interaction; capturing user intentionality; knowledge-based interfaces; principles of design and perception; collaboration; and interoperability. Ultimately, the goal of a science of interaction is to support the visual analytics community through the recognition and implementation of best practices in the representation of and interaction with visual displays.
The Science of Analytic Reporting
Chinchor N, and WA Pike. 2009. The Science of Analytic Reporting. Information Visualization 8(4):286-293.
Abstract
The challenge of visually communicating analysis results is central to the ability of visual analytics tools to support decision making and knowledge construction. The benefit of emerging visual methods will be improved through more effective exchange of the insights generated through the use of visual analytics. This paper outlines the major requirements for next-generation reporting systems in terms of eight major research needs: the development of best practices, design automation, visual rhetoric, context and audience, connecting analysis to presentation, evidence and argument, collaborative environments, and interactive and dynamic documents. It also describes an emerging technology called Active Products that introduces new techniques for analytic process capture and dissemination.
Visual analytics for law enforcement: deploying a service-oriented analytic framework for web-based visualization
Dowson S., J Bruce, DM Best, RM Riensche, L Franklin, WA Pike. 2009. "Visual analytics for law enforcement: deploying a service-oriented analytic framework for web-based visualization. Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence Proc. SPIE, Vol. 7346, 734603 2009
Abstract
This paper presents key components of the Law Enforcement Information Framework (LEIF), an information system that provides communications, situational awareness, and visual analytics tools in a service-oriented architecture supporting web-based desktop and handheld device users. LEIF simplifies interfaces and visualizations of well-established visual analytic techniques to improve usability. Advanced analytics capability is maintained by enhancing the underlying processing to support the new interface. LEIF development is driven by real-world user feedback gathered through deployments at three operational law enforcement organizations in the U.S. The system incorporates a robust information ingest pipeline supporting a wide variety of information formats. LEIF also insulates interface and analytical components from information sources making it easier to adapt the framework for many different data repositories.