| Descript |
291 p |
| Note |
Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 58-11, Section: B, page: 6053 |
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Adviser: Roger Schank |
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Thesis (Ph.D.)--Northwestern University, 1997 |
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Developing software to teach about organizations, ecosystems, and similar domains traditionally involves the time-consuming and error-prone task of building a complete simulation of the target system, then an interface to make its operation meaningful to students. An alternative approach is to conceptualize the world as a sequence of interesting outcomes, arising from student action and depicting pedagogically-important processes and events. This type of approach, called outcome-driven simulation, does not require an expert model of the domain, and keeps the experience pedagogically profitable by focusing on notable happenings in the world and omitting much of the rest |
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The Storyline-Based Approach, presented here, applies the concept of outcome-driven simulation to complex, participatory system domains, such as human behavior and ecology. Authors work to produce a goal-based scenario, a kind of role-playing management simulation In the GBS they produce, students act as manager, presented with problems to address and given a range of actions to take. When they take an action, they see the result, played out in digitized video, changes in numeric indicators, and the rise of new problems |
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In the Storyline-Based Approach, outcomes are data structures which drive a generic interface. They are connected together by transitions, triggers contingent on student actions or changes in variables. Authors invent outcomes and connect them together, via transitions, into a directed graph. At run-time, the graph is evaluated whenever a student takes an action, a triggered outcome specifying what to display on the interface. Graphs begin with a starting outcome and end in one or more terminating outcomes. One path through a graph constitutes a "storyline," similar to a plot in fictional works. Storylines have a logical beginning, a culmination, a flow of "scenes" from one to the other, and twists in plot. Equipped with a set of techniques for keeping outcome graphs structured and manageable, authors can generate rich and enduring GBSs. The approach is applied to two separate domains, one about the operation of a water company, the second about the ecological processes in a freshwater marsh |
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School code: 0163 |
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DDC |
| Host Item |
Dissertation Abstracts International 58-11B
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| Subject |
Psychology, Industrial
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Computer Science
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0624
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0984
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| Alt Author |
Northwestern University
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