Integrated Collaboration Environment for Sense-Making

Intelligence analysis is a cognitively intensive process that requires analysts to mine immense data sets, extract knowledge from collected evidence, understand the implications of such knowledge, and generate, evaluate, and defend selected explanations against all others – collectively referred to as the sense-making loop. While many tools have been developed to enhance data analysis, they typically address only isolated parts of the sense-making loop, and generally do not support interoperability across a suite of analysis tools. The result is a range of “stovepipe” systems that do not support fluid management of the analysis process. Furthermore, such stovepipe systems do not foster collaborative sharing of intelligence artifacts within teams. We propose to address these problems through the design of an Integrated Collaboration Environment for Sense-making (ICES), composed of: 1) a Visual Analytics Module providing an integrated suite of interactive tools supporting the entire sense-making loop; and 2) a Collaboration Workspace Module enabling the transmission of information between users within a shared workspace. The system will be developed using a human-centered design approach focused on enhancing analytical efficiency and effectiveness by accommodating rapid transformation of information across visual analytic representations as well as by supporting improved information sharing between distributed teams of analysts.