Pedagogical Application of Visualization and Eye Tracking For Electrical Grid Management

Abstract

Visualizations have been proven to be a beneficial pedagogical tool used in teaching complex concepts to students. Its application as an effective active learning method has been implemented in multiple sectors, such as arts, science, engineering, and social science. In this paper, we present a pilot study exploring the use of visualizations to facilitate students’ comprehension of electrical grid management principles in an active learning process. The methods for conducting the eye-tracking study are presented here, with the results available at the meeting. These results will illustrate how students engage with visualizations as part of the learning process. This study is part of a series of studies focused on examining how methods from human factors and ergonomics can be leveraged for evaluating electrical grid management control rooms. For instance, in a previous pilot study, eye tracking was used to evaluate situation awareness in electrical grid control rooms using visualizations. A comparison of the eye tracking results to the Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA), revealed four SA demons: misplaced salience, data overload, errant mental models, and attentional narrowing.

Keywords: Education, Electrical Grid, Eye Tracking, Human Factors, Visualization

DOI: 10.54941/ahfe1003167