Comparison of Cyber Network Defense Visual Displays

This work describes an Ecological Interface Design (EID) comparison of five displays (Alphanumeric, 2D and 3D Aggregate, Radial, and Treemap) on accuracy and latency performance for simple cyber network data analysis tasks. Twenty students from the Computer Science and Engineering Department at Wright State University participated for compensation. Questions (n = 12) ranged from global to specific aspects of the data and required two types of responses: numerical estimates and binary visual judgments. EID principles of attunement and specificity (Bennett & Flach, 2011) guided the interpretation of results. Participants answered faster when the display's visual forms (vertical extent, area, or angle) aligned with Cleveland's (1985) principles of graphical perception (i.e., attunement), and when the displays reflected the task structure of the question (i.e., specificity). Performance was best using the vertical extent displays. This research emphasizes the importance of using EID to create graphical displays to support cyber network defense analysts.