A splash of color: a dual dive into the efects of EVO on decision‑making with goal models

Yesugen Baatartogtokh, Irene Foster, Alicia Grubb

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Abstract: Recent approaches have investigated assisting users in making early trade-of decisions when the future evolution of project elements is uncertain. These approaches have demonstrated promise in their analytical capabilities; yet, stakeholders have expressed concerns about the readability of the models and resulting analysis, which builds upon Tropos. Tropos is based on formal semantics enabling automated analysis; however, this creates a problem of interpreting evidence pairs. The aim of our broader research project is to improve the process of model comprehension and decision-making by improving how analysts interpret and make decisions. We extend and evaluate a prior approach, called EVO, which uses color to visualize evidence pairs. In this article, we explore the efectiveness of EVO with and without the impacts of tooling through a twophased empirical study. All subjects in both phases were untrained modelers, given training at study time. First, we conduct an experiment to measure any efect of using colors to represent evidence pairs. Second, we explore how subjects engage in decision-making activities (with or without color) through a user study. We fnd that the EVO co