The role of the crucial experiment in student modelling

Evertsz, Rick (1991). The role of the crucial experiment in student modelling. PhD thesis The Open University.

Abstract

As the range of models which tutoring systems can capture is extended, efficient diagnosis becomes more difficult. This thesis describes a solution to this problem based on the generation of 'Critical Problems'; their role in student modelling is analogous to that of the 'Crucial Experiment' in science. We argue that great diagnostic power can be obtained by generating discriminatory problem examples. In general, efficient diagnosis is just not possible without such an hypothesis-testing capability. We describe a program, PO, which given a pair of production rule models and a description of the class of problems which the student must solve, generates an abstract specification of the problems which discriminate between those two hypotheses. Through a process termed 'Abstract Interpretation', PO tips the balance in favour of diagnostic measurement. The key to this problem lies in the realisation that we are only interested in the abstract mapping between a model's inputs and outputs; from the point of view of generating a Critical Problem, the intermediate processing of the model is irrelevant.

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