Autism is a developmental disorder characterized by atypical behaviors in three different areas: social interaction, communication, and stereotyped or repetitive patterns of behavior and interests. Classic autism is one of several related conditions that comprise Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASDs), also known as Pervasive Developmental Disorders (PDDs). While the specific causes of autism are unknown, its etiology can be traced through genetic and environmental factors, brain development and functioning, cognition, and finally, behavioral manifestations.

We hypothesize that certain individuals on the autism spectrum exhibit a bias towards using visual instead of verbal mental representations for various tasks. This “thinking in pictures” form of cognition has been introspectively reported by many individuals on the autism spectrum, such as Temple Grandin, a high-functioning adult with autism who has written several autobiographical books touching on this notion.

Evaluating this hypothesis raises several research questions, for instance: 1) Do some individuals on the autism spectrum think in pictures, and if so, how can we identify them? 2) What kinds of visual mental representations are being used, how are they different, if at all, from neurotypical visual representations, and how are they recruited to perform various cognitive tasks? 3) What advances can be made in assessment, communication, and education, given this information about types of mental representations?

We are addressing these and other questions through a combination of designing behavioral studies intended to tease apart differences in mental representations and using computational models to make and evaluate precise specifications of various representational forms. Our long term goals include developing a set of design principles that can be used to construct tools for assessment and education for the autism community.

Tools

Design by Analogy to Nature Engine

About

Biologically inspired design, a kind of design by analogy, requires that engineers understand complex biological systems as analogues for design. A number of typical characteristics make biologically inspired design an especially interesting problem to study. (1) By definition, biologically inspired design is based on analogies requiring expertise across two disparate domains (e.g. architecture and biology), and thus is inherently interdisciplinary. (2) Since the objects, relations and processes across domains are very different, design collaborators speak from different lexicons. (3) Since biologists in general seek to understand the functions of designs occurring in nature whereas designers generally seek to generate designs for human needs, they use different methods of investigation and have different perspectives on design. (4) The resources, such as materials and processes, available in nature to realize an abstract design concept are very different from the resources available in the human domain.

Despite many pioneering and valiant efforts, the fact is that at present there is no science of biologically inspired design, and its practice remains scattered, empirical, and ad hoc. This raises many basic questions such as: How do biologists and engineers work together in teams? How do they generate new design ideas? How do they understand biological systems? What external knowledge representations of biological systems may help deepen their understanding? What should we teach in courses on biologically inspired design and how should we teach it? While these questions are critical to developing a science of biologically inspired design, they also provide a great opportunity to explore fundamental questions about cognition.

Image Credit:

The “Biologically-Inspired Design Project Banner” image on our website incorporates the following works. All of these listed works are licensed under Creative Commons CC BY 2.0:

• “Anatomy of the Brain Embroidery” by Hey Paul Studios at http://www.flickr.com/photos/45257015@N03/7251295354
• “tree house lightbulb” by Thomas Hammer at http://www.flickr.com/photos/56732041@N06/8004804680
• “Project 365 #44: 130209 A Bit of a Mix Up” by comedy_nose at http://www.fotopedia.com/items/flickr-3276362047
• “Greenday gecko” by Rene Mensen at http://www.flickr.com/photos/44206268@N07/8212301132

The Systems Thinking project at the Design & Intelligence lab broadly focuses on teaching students at various levels to engage in thinking about complex, and especially ecological, systems. The project specifically addresses multiple specific tasks and abilities:

• Helping students understand complex systems through the construction of structure-behavior-function models (Goel et al. 2010; Goel et al. 2013).
• Providing feedback on model construction through dynamically-generated invokable simulations based on conceptual models (Vattam, Goel, & Rugaber 2010; Joyner, Goel, & Papin 2014).
• Facilitating the broader process of scientific inquiry, grounded in model construction (Joyner, Majerich, & Goel 2013).
• Providing personalized feedback on modeling and inquiry through metacognitive tutoring agents (Joyner & Goel 2014).

The Systems Thinking project has been under active development for over ten years. Over one thousand students have used the tools constructed within the project. The first of these tools, the Aquarium Construction Toolkit (ACT), allowed students to construct structure-behavior-function models of aquaria based on investigation of a classroom aquarium. The second tool, the Ecological Modeling Toolkit (EMT), built and expanded on ACT by generalizing the construction of models out into various ecological systems, such as ponds, lakes, and estuaries. The third and current tool, the Modeling & Inquiry Learning Application (MILA), augments the modeling process with multiple tools for inquiry to facilitate model-based inquiry in addition to modeling alone.