2017.10.10: This publication is available free of charge from: https://doi.org/10.6028/NIST.IR.8194
Phishing, the transmission of a message spoofing a legitimate sender about a legitimate subject with intent to perform malicious activity, causes a tremendous and rapidly-increasing amount of damage to information systems and users annually. This project implements an exploratory computational model of user decision making in a potential phishing attack scenario. The model demonstrates how contextual factors, such as message subject matter match to current work concerns, and personality factors, such as conscientiousness, contribute to users' decisions to comply with or ignore message requests.
2017.01.23: This article, first published online in Human Factors: The Journal of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, describes a computational cognitive process model developed by Dr. Franklin Tamborello. The model captures correct human performance and error in three laboratory tasks. Error classes including perseveration, omission, and postcompletion error fall naturally out of the theory. Model source code for the two form-filling tasks ("postcompletion") and the continuous classification task ("UNRAVEL") are available from Dr. Tamborello's Github site.
2016.12.03: I posted an initial working version of the exploratory Brunswickian Lens model of user decision making in a potential phishing attack scenario.
2016.06.11: Update for ACT-R 7 compatibility
2015.10.01: We are very proud and excited to announce that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has awarded funding for our latest project! We are building an exploratory computational model of why some people sometimes fall prey to phishing attacks.
2015.03.13: Franklin P. Tamborello, II, PhD, CSP has completed all requirements for a Board of Certified Safety Professionals (BCSP) certification. This highly respected certification is awarded by BCSP to individuals who meet eligibility criteria and experience in the safety, health, and environmental (SH&E) discipline, and have passed an examination.
Safety issues have become more complex and today's safety professional must continually be better qualified. BCSP credential holders are among the most highly trained, educated, and experienced individuals in the safety field. Having achieved a BCSP certification shows that the individual has mastered the core competency required for professional safety practice. BCSP's Chief Executive Officer, Dr. Turnbeaugh, CSP, CET, comments that "It is critical to maintain competent individuals within the SH&E industry because of the impact they have on the safety of workers and the public."
ACT-Touch (r13) is now distributed as an extra included with ACT-R (r1732).
Revision 13 is designed for compatibility with ACT-R 6.1.
We are very happy to announce that our article entitled Peer-Mediation of the Adoption of Efficient Software Interaction Methods: A Model Based on Priming is now published with Computers in Human Behavior!
Cogscent is pleased to announce the initial release of ACT-Touch, an extension to the ACT-R cognitive modeling framework. ACT-Touch, in combination with ACT-R, establishes a working framework useful for modeling and simulation of human interactions with mobile touchscreen devices. As we build computers that leave behind the traditional desktop environment, our cognitive modeling tools must address a different set of human-computer interaction challenges and interaction styles than are present in desktop computer environments, including smaller displays and slower text input due to lack of full-sized physical keyboards. But new advantages brought about by mobility and direct physical manipulation of interface elements also must be addressed. These are important influences on cognition not typically present in a desktop computing environment. ACT-Touch enables modeling cognition situated in such task environments by extending ACT-R with motor movements typically found in multitouch display gestures.
The initial release of ACT-Touch was presented at this summer's 19th Annual ACT-R Workshop at Carnegie Mellon University. ACT-Touch currently supports simulation of basic gestural inputs, such as taps, swipes and other gestures. Additional work is intended to address further challenges such as visual occlusion of the display by the hand, motor learning of gestures, and mobility. ACT-Touch was made possible by grant 60NANB12D134 from the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
We are very proud and excited to announce that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has awarded funding for our proposal to bring multi-touchscreen interaction capabilities to the ACT-R cognitive architecture!