Examining novice misconceptions of satellite imaging

Raechel Bianchetti, Michigan State University
Remote sensing images are available to the general public through media outlets, navigational tools, and other tools. Novice users are asked to complete increasingly complex tasks with images. User conceptions have implications for their ability to understand scenes, both in isolation and as base maps. After the disappearance of Malaysian Airlines Flight MH370, novices began voicing their opinions regarding the use of satellite imagery in the search. Novices also assisted in the search of wreckage by TomNod, a well-established program for crowd-sourcing image analysis tasks. The conceptions that TomNod users, and novice users in general, have has important implications on their analysis results. To assess current novice understanding of remote sensing two methods were used. First, a survey was conducted of novices concerning their understanding of remote sensing. Second, news site comments, regarding MH370, were also mined. Here we present results from these sources and framework for a larger study.

Transcript

1. Examining novice misconceptions of satellite imaging Dr. Raechel A. Bianchetti Michigan State University
2. Imagery & MH370 Investigation
3. Imagery & MH370 Investigation
4. Crowdsourcing Image Analysis
5. Research Question •  Types of image analysis tasks: •  Identification, Recognition, Classification •  Delineation •  Enumeration, Mensuration •  Public participation image analysis: Identification •  What do member’s of the general public believe about satellite imaging? •  Could misunderstandings cause barriers to image analysis?
6. Method: Text Analysis •  Text Analysis •  Measured: •  How prevalent is imaging technology in user comments? •  What misconceptions proliferated in discussions?
7. Media User Comments
8. Results: Concepts tied to remote sensing •  Motion and change detection •  Surveillance •  Distance
9. Method: Survey •  Online Survey using Mechanical Turk •  80/84 complete surveys •  Measured: •  How do people define imaging technology terms? •  How well do people understand the capabilities of satellite imaging?
10. Results: What does remote sensing mean? •  You use a remote to control a sensor somewhere •  It’s what the camera on the door at the supermarket does •  It’s a sixth sense that you know something is happening •  It’s when I send a letter to my friend somewhere else and they get it automatically (email???) •  Something robots do •  Anything measured not by humans
11. Results: How are images captured? •  We query a catalog of images on the satellite •  Satellites float around in space and just take a bunch of photos •  GPS satellites capture images •  A camera or sensor takes images from the satellite
12. Survey: Participant Characteristics
13. Results: Have you…
14. Results: What can satellites…?
15. Discussion •  Novices have incomplete understanding of: •  Mechanisms for capturing images •  Variation in sensor capabilities {resolution, spectral} •  There exists GPS satellites and Imaging satellites
16. Expansion •  Targeted comment collection •  Explicit discussion of imaging •  Refined survey closely coupled with the text analysis •  More focus on concepts identified in this analysis •  Conducting a science audience survey
17. Questions •  Thank you! •  Dr. Alan MacEachren, Pennsylvania State University •  Grant McKenzie, UC-Santa Barbara