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Visualization Psychology: Foundations for an Interdisciplinary Research Program

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Visualization Psychology

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Abstract

What might a discipline of Visualization Psychology look like? If research on the psychological aspects of visualization were to coalesce, in the sense of a Lakatosian research program, what refutation-resistant theoretical commitments would magnetize its “hard core”? In this chapter, we argue that any interdisciplinary inquiry concerned with psychological aspects of visualization should situate its phenomena in the broader context of external representation, as a (triadic) semiotic activity achieved via information processing in a distributed cognitive system.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Self-identified as the “premier forum for advances in visualization and visual analytics,” VIS is sponsored by the IEEE (The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) Computer Society and Technical Committee (special interest group) on Visualization and Graphics (TCVG).

  2. 2.

    One might also find research detailing interaction with graphics in other applied branches of Psychology—the use of multimedia graphics in the courtroom, for example—however the theories, models, and frameworks governing the basic science of such occurrences would likely come from cognitive, educational, or perceptual psychology.

  3. 3.

    Referring to the annual IEEE combined conferences on Information Visualization (InfoVIS), Scientific Visualization (SciVIS), and Visual Analytics Science and Technology (VAST).

  4. 4.

    Palmer reserves the qualifier cognitive for internal representations, designating the external as “noncognitive.” Following a distributed cognitive perspective, we would characterize both as cognitive representations and prefer the term “mental” to describe those representations not perceivable to others.

  5. 5.

    More “accessible” is perhaps the more generous characterization.

  6. 6.

    Particularly in Cognitive Science, Learning Science/Educational Psychology, and disciplinary education like Math, Chemistry, and Physics.

  7. 7.

    The International Conference on the Theory and Application of Diagrams is a biennial gathering held since 2000, attended by a cross-section of Philosophers, Psychologists, Mathematicians, and Computer Scientists.

  8. 8.

    Note that clarity and simplicity do not imply truth. The designer of a representation has a voice that is echoed in every design decision, from what information to include to how to encode it.

  9. 9.

    “No treatment of semiotics can claim to be comprehensive because, in the broadest sense (as a general theory of signs), it embraces the whole field of signification, including “life, the universe, and everything,” regardless of whether the signs are goal-directed (or interpreted as being so)” [12, pg. xvi].

  10. 10.

    Epistemology and Design of human–InFormation Interaction in Cognitive activitiEs.

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Acknowledgements

We offer thanks to Pamela Riviere for offering a diagram of neural data in Fig. 9.1, to Arvind Satyanarayan, Paul Parsons, David Kirsh, and Oisin Parkinsoncoombs for productive discussions on these topics, and to anonymous reviewers for productive feedback.

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  1. University of California San Diego, La Jolla, CA, USA

    Amy Rae Fox & James D. Hollan

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  1. Amy Rae Fox
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, CO, USA

    Danielle Albers Szafir

  2. Department of Computer Science, King's College London, London, UK

    Rita Borgo

  3. OeRC, Department of Engineering Science, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Min Chen

  4. Department of Public Health, Swansea University, Swansea, UK

    Darren J. Edwards

  5. School of Interactive Arts & Technology, Simon Fraser University, Surrey, BC, Canada

    Brian Fisher

  6. Northeastern University, Boston, USA

    Lace Padilla

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Fox, A.R., Hollan, J.D. (2023). Visualization Psychology: Foundations for an Interdisciplinary Research Program. In: Albers Szafir, D., Borgo, R., Chen, M., Edwards, D.J., Fisher, B., Padilla, L. (eds) Visualization Psychology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-34738-2_9

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