Risky Business: Evaluation of a Decision Support System For Use in a High Risk Environment

Date

2011-09-14

Authors

Doan, Tyler

Journal Title

Journal ISSN

Volume Title

Publisher

University of Guelph

Abstract

Neuromuscular diseases are difficult to diagnose, requiring specialized equipment and training. A decision support system facilitates this by visualizing the data produced by a classification system, allowing users to make a diagnosis. This thesis explores the development of a specific component of the decision support system; a comparison tool which allows the user to explore the visualization by making comparisons between assertions derived from the underlying classification system. After studying the impact of the comparison tool upon the performance of volunteer users, we provide recommendations on the utility of a particular decision exploration strategy and give guidance for the correct course for the future development of this system. This document illustrates some of the unique challenges associated with the evaluation of a decision support system which relies not only upon the computational power of the computer, but also upon a human’s innate ability to solve problems.

Description

Keywords

Decision Support System, Information Visualization

Citation