Authors:
Ting-Yun Hou
1
;
Yu-Tzu Lin
1
;
Yu-Chih Lin
2
;
Chia-Hu Chang
3
and
Miao-Hsuan Yen
1
Affiliations:
1
National Taiwan Normal University, Taiwan
;
2
Yuanpei University, Taiwan
;
3
National Taiwan University, Taiwan
Keyword(s):
Computer Programming, Eye Tracking, Cognition Process, Program Debugging, Sequential Analysis.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Computer-Supported Education
;
e-Learning
;
Higher Order Thinking Skills
;
Instructional Design
;
Learning/Teaching Methodologies and Assessment
Abstract:
This study addresses the gender differences of cognitive processes involved in program debugging. In the
experiment, twenty-five participants were asked to find bugs in the test programs. Eye-movement analysis
was employed to track the students’ gaze paths while they traced and tried to debug the programs. Cognitive
processes were then obtained by employing sequential analysis of gaze data to investigate the significant
sequences of attention areas. Cognitive processes of different genders were investigated by comparing the
tracing sequences of program debugging. The experimental results show that both genders had limited
working memory capacities for debugging the iterative program with complex computation. But females
needed more manual calculation for the recursive program in this study. For the iterative structure, females
tended to grasp the program requirements and then trace into the major part of the program, while males
traced the change of output value according to the logi
c of the iterative statements. For the recursive
problem, females traced the flow of recursive induction and the stop condition to execute the program and
find bugs, while males traced the recursive function in a more leaping way. This study leaks the gender
differences of cognitive processes in program debugging, based on which instructors/researchers can
develop adaptive computer programming instruction for students of different genders.
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