Knowledge Structures: Recent Developments In Theory And Application

Book excerpt: Founded in 1985 by Jean-Claude Falmagne and Jean-Paul Doignon, Knowledge Structure Theory (KST) constitutes a rigorous and current mathematical theory for the representation and the assessment of human knowledge. The seminal work of these authors initiated a highly active research strand with an ever-growing literature, mostly scattered across various technical journals.Starting from a concise but comprehensive introduction to its foundations, this volume provides a state-of-the-art review of KST. For the first time the volume brings together the most important theoretical developments and extensions of the last decade and presents new areas of application beyond education, with contributions by key researchers in the field.Among the important advances covered by this book are (1) a comprehensive treatment of probabilistic models in KST; (2) polytomous extensions of the theory; (3) KST-based psychological diagnostics and neuropsychological assessment; (4) the representation and assessment of cognitive skills in problem solving, as well as procedural skills. In addition, this book also includes an overview of available software for the application of KST.