Too much, too little, or just right? Ways explanations impact end users' mental models

Research is emerging on how end users can correct mistakes their intelligent agents make, but before users can correctly "debug" an intelligent agent, they need some degree of understanding of how it works. In this paper we consider ways intelligent agents should explain themselves to end users, especially focusing on how the soundness and completeness of the explanations impacts the fidelity of end users' mental models. Our findings suggest that completeness is more important than soundness: increasing completeness via certain information types helped participants' mental models and, surprisingly, their perception of the cost/benefit tradeoff of attending to the explanations. We also found that oversimplification, as per many commercial agents, can be a problem: when soundness was very low, participants experienced more mental demand and lost trust in the explanations, thereby reducing the likelihood that users will pay attention to such explanations at all

Slave to the Algorithm? Why a \u27Right to an Explanation\u27 Is Probably Not the Remedy You Are Looking For

Algorithms, particularly machine learning (ML) algorithms, are increasingly important to individuals’ lives, but have caused a range of concerns revolving mainly around unfairness, discrimination and opacity. Transparency in the form of a “right to an explanation” has emerged as a compellingly attractive remedy since it intuitively promises to open the algorithmic “black box” to promote challenge, redress, and hopefully heightened accountability. Amidst the general furore over algorithmic bias we describe, any remedy in a storm has looked attractive. However, we argue that a right to an explanation in the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is unlikely to present a complete remedy to algorithmic harms, particularly in some of the core “algorithmic war stories” that have shaped recent attitudes in this domain. Firstly, the law is restrictive, unclear, or even paradoxical concerning when any explanation-related right can be triggered. Secondly, even navigating this, the legal conception of explanations as “meaningful information about the logic of processing” may not be provided by the kind of ML “explanations” computer scientists have developed, partially in response. ML explanations are restricted both by the type of explanation sought, the dimensionality of the domain and the type of user seeking an explanation. However, “subject-centric explanations (SCEs) focussing on particular regions of a model around a query show promise for interactive exploration, as do explanation systems based on learning a model from outside rather than taking it apart (pedagogical versus decompositional explanations) in dodging developers\u27 worries of intellectual property or trade secrets disclosure. Based on our analysis, we fear that the search for a “right to an explanation” in the GDPR may be at best distracting, and at worst nurture a new kind of “transparency fallacy.” But all is not lost. We argue that other parts of the GDPR related (i) to the right to erasure ( right to be forgotten ) and the right to data portability; and (ii) to privacy by design, Data Protection Impact Assessments and certification and privacy seals, may have the seeds we can use to make algorithms more responsible, explicable, and human-centered

Explanatory debugging: Supporting end-user debugging of machine-learned programs

Many machine-learning algorithms learn rules of behavior from individual end users, such as task-oriented desktop organizers and handwriting recognizers. These rules form a “program” that tells the computer what to do when future inputs arrive. Little research has explored how an end user can debug these programs when they make mistakes. We present our progress toward enabling end users to debug these learned programs via a Natural Programming methodology. We began with a formative study exploring how users reason about and correct a text-classification program. From the results, we derived and prototyped a concept based on “explanatory debugging”, then empirically evaluated it. Our results contribute methods for exposing a learned program's logic to end users and for eliciting user corrections to improve the program's predictions

Investigating the Intelligibility of a Computer Vision System for Blind Users

Computer vision systems to help blind usersare becoming increasingly common yet often these systems are not intelligible. Our work investigates the intelligibility of a wearable computer vision system to help blind users locate and identify people in their vicinity. Providing a continuous stream of information, this system allows us to explore intelligibility through interaction and instructions, going beyond studies of intelligibility that focus on explaining a decision a computer vision system might make. In a study with 13 blind users, we explored whether varying instructions (either basic or enhanced) about how the system worked would change blind users’ experience of the system. We found offering a more detailed set of instructions did not affect how successful users were using the system nor their perceived workload. We did, however, find evidence of significant differences in what they knew about the system, and they employed different, and potentially more effective, use strategies. Our findings have important implications for researchers and designers of computer vision systemsfor blind users, as well more general implications for understanding what it means to make interactive computer vision systems intelligible

Wasted opportunities: Problematic alcohol and drug use among gay men and bisexual men

This report describes the findings from a qualitative and quantitative study of alcohol and drug use among gay and bisexual men and other men that have sex with men (MSM) in England. The qualitative element describes the experiences and understandings of men who identified themselves as being concerned about their alcohol or drug use. The quantitative element shows the broader picture of use and concern about use among MSM. So we go from a broad picture of the extent of alcohol and drug use and concern about it, to a narrower and more detailed focus on men experiencing concern and problems related to alcohol and drug use. The aims of the study are to qualitatively explore the contexts and attendant needs of men who are concerned about their substance use, to locate that use within the broader MSM population and to suggest ways in which the drug-related needs of MSM might be better met. So we have specifically recruited men who were concerned about their substance use and investigated the way these men used drugs and alcohol, what drugs and alcohol mean to them and the harms caused by drugs and alcohol. Many men, perhaps the majority, use alcohol and other drugs without any mishap or unhappiness. However, the range of experiences described highlight the pervasive and often detrimental role that alcohol and other drugs play in the social and personal lives of many men. Although there is some research which examines the effects of substance use treatments on sexual risk behaviour (that is, do drugs services reduce unsafe sex), there is little or no research which investigates the accessibility, acceptability or effectiveness of current substance use services for gay men and other MSM. So in the qualitative interviews we also sought information about the role services played in meeting drug-related needs, for example information, motivational and practical support

The british mental health service user / survivor movement and the experience of mental distress

O presente estudo dedica-se a compreender como o engajamento com o movimento britânico de usuários/sobreviventes (SUSM) afetou a experiência de sofrimento mental dos usuários participantes. Baseado em entrevistas com ativistas do movimento, nós analisamos suas experiências pessoais; o processo de engajamento com o SUSM e seus relatos da dinâmica do movimento; e finalmente, os efeitos do engajamento com o SUSM para suas experiências de sofrimento mental. Nossos reultados indicaram que o engajamento com o movimento possibilita aos participantes construir sentidos mais positivos para o seu sofrimento mental e reconstruir suas identidades. O engajamento com o movimento também permitiu a eles desenvolver um novo papel social. A pressão grupal e conflitos internos ao SUSM, assim como as relações de confronto com atores externos, no entando, causa efeitos prejudiciais. Em geral, o envolvimento produz um nível de transformação subjetiva para os envolvidos em relação ao seu sofrimento mental; ABSTRACT: The present study examines how engaging with the British service user/survivor movement (SUSM) affected the experience of mental distress of mental health service users. Based upon interviews with participants of this movement, we have analysed their personal experiences of mental distress; the process of engagement with the SUSM and their accounts of the movement's dynamics; the effects of the engagement with the SUSM to their experiences of mental distress. Our results indicated that engaging with this movement allowed for participants to construct more positive meanings for their experience and reconstruct identities. The engagement with the movement also allows for them to develop a new social role. Pressure to conform, internal conflicts within the SUSM and confrontational relations with external actors, however, cause detrimental effects. Overall, engagement has produced a level of subjective transformation to those involved in relation to their mental distress