ABSTRACT
Search and interpretation occupy places of special importance in discovery. Search uncovers phenomena; interpretation gives them meaning. Search underlies the development of hypotheses from theories, and the design of experiments from hypotheses (Klahr & Dunbar, 1988); interpretation connects observations and experimental results back to hypotheses, and thus to theories (Shrager, 1990). In theory revision, search and interpretation work hand-inhand: scientists search among possible abstract theories and then, in interpretive steps, revise their emerging concrete theories based upon the selected abstractions (Shrager, 1990).
