Research and Advances
Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning

Psychology of calculator languages: a framework for describing differences in users' knowledge

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This paper presents a framework for describing users' knowledge of how a simple four-function calculator operates. Differences among novices and experts in their conceptions of “what goes on inside the calculator” for various sequences of button presses are summarized. Individual differences include different views on when an expression is evaluated, different procedures for evaluating a chain of arithmetic, and different rules for evaluating unusual sequences of key presses.

View this article in the ACM Digital Library.

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