Assistant Professor in Accounting Information Systems, Pamplin College of Business, Virginia Tech; Center for Human-Computer Interaction, Virginia Tech
Object-oriented (OO) analysis, design, and programming techniques have emerged as potential solutions to the software crisis. However, learning OO techniques can be a difficult process. This study investigates students' perceptions of the difficulties in learning and using OO techniques. Two groups of students who had recently completed a sixteen-week course on OO systems development participated in the study. Cognitive mapping techniques implemented with group support system (GSS) technology were used to gather information on the students' perceptions. The groups used the GSS to identify what was difficult about learning and using OO techniques, classify these concepts into categories, rank the relative importance of each category, and determine the relationships among the categories. Importance rankings of the categories show that learning basic object concepts was most important to and most difficult for the students, followed by design issues, and programming techniques. Composite cognitive maps of the shared perceptions of group members suggest that educators and industry trainers can reduce the difficulties of learning OO concepts by teaching simplified methodologies and controlling difficulties of the programming environment.
Cognitive maps are valuable tools for understanding individual and group perceptions. But developing such maps is a resource-intensive activity. To reduce required resources, group support system (GSS) technology is proposed as an aid in uncovering cognitive maps. A GSS session was used to develop a cognitive map of users of object-oriented (OO) techniques perceptions of OO system complexity. Seven participants identified concepts and categories, categorized the concepts, rated category importance, and defined relationships between categories. The data collected and analyses performed provide the basis for a cognitive map of the participants' perceptions of OO system complexity. A comparison with similar individual cognitive mapping results supports further investigation of using the GSS approach for identifying perceptions of complexity.