The Enactive equation: Exploring How Multiple External Representations are Integrated, Using a Fully Controllable Interface and Eye-Tracking

Representational competence (RC), defined as "the ability to simultaneously process and integrate multiple external representations (MERs) in a domain", is a marker of expertise in science and engineering. However, the cognitive mechanisms underlying this ability and how this ability develops in learners, is poorly understood. In this paper, we report a fully controllable interface, designed to help school students develop RC. Further, as the design emerged from the application of distributed and embodied cognition theory to the RC problem, the design also seeks to shed light on the cognitive mechanisms underlying the integration of MERs. Here we report a preliminary eye and mouse tracking study, which sought to develop a detailed understanding of how students interacted with our interface, under self and text-guided exploration conditions. We also examined how the interaction process related to students' ability to integrate the representations in the interface. Results highlighted several desirable student behaviors, and potential points of modification of the interface to improve integration of MERs.