A Distributed Cognition Based Tool for Information Trajectory Analysis

Distributed cognition is a useful approach to study the interaction between agents (humans or artefacts) in a system, such as the collaboration involved in air traffic control. When taking a distributed cognition perspective, information processing can be directly observed. This provides the opportunity to explore how information moves through a system, and to identify specific areas where (pervasive) technology can be introduced. However, the analysis involved can not be simply used "off-the-shelf" and must be tailored to a specific scenario. Furthermore, the amount of time spent conducting the analysis is often quite significant. This motivates the need for a software tool to support this kind of analysis, to guide the researcher, and reduce the amount of time spent on analysis. This paper presents a prototype of such a tool.