The Effect of Cognitive Abilities and Learning Approach on Domain Surface Understanding from a Process Model

Process models are used by information professionals to convey semantics about the business operations in a real-world domain that are intended to be supported by an information system. The understandability of these models is vital to them actually being used. Until now, understandability has primarily been defined as an intrinsic quality of the models themselves. In this paper we conceptualize model understandability as an emergent property and advance an integrative framework to understand the role of the user in the process of understanding process models. Building on cognitive psychology, student learning theory and multimedia learning theory, we identify important factors during the presage and process stages of learning, and hypothesize their contributions to realizing domain understanding from a process model. Through an empirical study, we provide evidence that cognitive abilities, learning style and learning approach influence the development of domain understanding. We detail implications for theory and practice.