ABSTRACT
In the preceding chapter a taxonomy of problem types was proposed, and some hypotheses set forth about the general kinds of skills and knowledge needed to solve problems of each type. The present chapter, adopting the same information-processing point of view as the previous one, undertakes three tasks. The first part of the chapter sets forth the general theory of human problem solving thai has emerged from research in the past two decades, especially research that has employed the m~thods of computer simulation and analysis of thinking-aloud protocols. The second part examines recent and ongoing research aimed at giving an account of the role of perceptual processes in problem solving and adescription of the processes for generating problem representations, and research aimed at extending the theory to problem solving in domains that are rich in semantic information and less weil structured than those that have been examined in the past. The third part of the chapter discusses some of the methodological issues that must be faced in using the methodologies of simulation and protocol analysis and, in general, to test detailed processing models of human cognitive performance.
