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Anne Britt, Ph.D. |
I do really cool research about how people comprehend, evaluate and write arguments. In earlier work, our research team found significant deficits in college students’ ability to comprehend, evaluate, and produce arguments. The source of these deficits was traced, and three tutorials were developed that provide instruction and practice to improve these argument skills. Each tutorial has been shown to be effective in overcoming particular deficits. In our current project we are developing computer-based instructional modules to improve their argument comprehension and production skills. These modules will be available online as stand-alone lessons and as a course presented in the context of a simple role playing game. In collaboration with Charles Perfetti, Gareth Gabrys, and Mara Georgi, I developed a java application, the Sourcer's Apprentice, to train high-school students to better attned to source information in citation. Go to a short demo of the Sourcer's Apprentice . I am part of the Discourse and Technology group here at NIU. We are always looking for new people to work with. Check it out! |
Courses:
Cognitive Psychology (Psyc 345)
Instructional Psychology (Psyc 514X)
Advanced Statistics (Psyc 504)
Education:
B.S. Psychology,
M.S. Cognitive Psychology,
Ph.D. Cognitive Psychology,
Research interests:
Argument comprehension and production.
Technology and literacy education.
Integration of semantic information across multiple documents.
Learning and reasoning from multiple documents.
Grants:
Acquiring Research Investigative and Evaluative Skills (ARIES) for Scientific
Inquiry
R305B070349 (2007-2011). $1,986,743.00 from the U.S. Department of Education.
PI: Keith Millis. Co-PI’s with, Katja Wiemer, and Joe Magliano..
Recruitment and Retention of Minority Role Models in
Science and Engineering through Improving Critical Thinking Skills and
Scientific Understanding $297,600
from the U.S. Department of Education. Keith Millis PI, CO-PIs with Katja Wiemer,
and Joe Magliano.
Creating a Usable Environment to Teach Argument
Comprehension and Production Skills (2005-2008). $574,931 from the U.S. Department of
Education.
Improving students comprehension and construction of
arguments (2002-2005). $358,876 from the U.S. Department of
Education.
Testing a model of situation recognition (January 2002 - September 2004). $100,000 for
research contract from Sandia National Laboratories. Co-PI’s with Joe Magliano
and John Skowronski.
Argument
Comprehension and Production in college students (6/02 -6/03). NIU Social Science Research Institute
Faculty Fellowship.
Recent papers:
Larson, A.A., Britt, M. A.,
& Kurby, C. (Accepted for publication). Improving students’ evaluation of
informal arguments. Journal of Experimental Education.
Britt, M. A., Kurby, C. A.,
Dandotkar, S., & Wolfe, C.R. (In Press). I Agreed with What? Memory for
Simple Argument Claims. Discourse Processes.
Wolfe, C.R. & Britt,
M.A. (2008). The Locus of the Myside Bias in Written Argumentation. Thinking and Reasoning, 14(1),
1–27.
Magliano, J.P., Skowronski,
J., Britt, M.A, Guss, D., & Forsythe, C. (2008). What Do You Want? How
Perceivers Use Cues to Make Goal Inferences About Others. Cognition, 106, 594–632.
Coutinho, S.,
Wiemer-Hastings, K., Skowronski, J.J., & Britt, M.A. (2005). Metacognition,
need for cognition and use of explanations during ongoing learning and problem
solving. Learning and Individual
Differences, 15(4), 321-337.
Kurby, C.A., Britt, M.A.,
& Magliano, J.P. (2005). The role of top-down and bottom-up processes in
between-text integration. Reading
Psychology, 26(4-5), 335-362.
Britt, M.A., & Sommer, J. (2004). Facilitating
textual integration with macro-structure focusing task. Reading Psychology,
25, 313 - 339.
Britt, M.A., Wiemer-Hasting, P., Larson, A., & Perfetti,
C.A. (2004). Automated feedback on source citation in essay writing. International
Journal of Artificial Intelligence in Education, 14(3-4), 359
– 374.
Larson, M., Britt, M.A., & Larson, A. (2004).
Disfluencies in comprehending argumentative texts. Reading Psychology,
25(3), 205-224.
Britt, M.A., & Gabrys, G. (2004). Collecting
responses through Web page drag and drop. Behavior Research Methods,
Instruments, and Computers, 36(1), 52-68.
Sagarin, B. J., Britt, M. A., Wood, S., Heider, J.,
& Lynch, J. (2004). Intrusive technology: Bartering and stealing consumer
attention. In W. R. Walker, & D. K. Herrmann (Eds), Cognitive
technology: Essays on the transformation of thought and society (pp.
69-88). Jefferson, NC: McFarland & Company, Inc. Publishers..
Sagarin, B. J., Britt, M. A., Wood, S., Heider, J.,
& Lynch, J. (2003). Bartering Our Attention: The Distraction and Persuasion
Effects of On-Line Advertisements. Cognitive Technology, 8(3).
Britt, M.A. & Larson, A. (2003). Construction of argument
representations during on-line reading.
Journal of Memory and Language, 48(4), 749-810.
Britt, M.A., & Aglinski, C. (2002). Improving
student’s ability to use source information. Cognition and Instruction, 20(40),
485-522.
Britt, M.A., & Gabrys, G. (2002). Implications of
document-level literacy skills for web-site design. Behavior Research
Methods, Instruments, and Computers, 34(2), 170-176.
Britt, M.A., & Gabrys, G. (2001). Teaching advanced literacy skills for
the World Wide Web. In Wolfe, Christopher R. (Ed). Learning and teaching on
the World Wide Web (pp. 73-90). San Diego, CA, US: Academic Press.
Britt, M.A., Perfetti, C.A., Van Dyke, J., &
Gabrys, G. (2000). The Sourcer’s
Apprentice: A Tool for Document-Supported History Instruction. To appear in P.
Stearns (Ed.), Knowing,
Teaching and Learning History: National and International Perspectives. New
York: NYU Press.
Presentation of argument terms for CT
Labs:
Discourse technology group
Argument understanding
M. Anne Britt (britt@niu.edu )
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