Decision e Informacion en Solucion de Problemas. Publicacion No. 77 (Information and Decision Making in Problem Solving. Publication No. 77).

A technique using information and decision-making theories to evaluate problem solving tactics is presented. In problem solving, the process of solution is evaluated by investigating the questions that the subject doing the problem solving asks. The sequence of questions asked is called a tactic. It is assumed that: (1) tactics are the observable images of the problem solving process; (2) questions asked reduce uncertainty; (3) if the subject has solved the problem without reducing his uncertainty to zero it is very likely that he or she has guessed; and (4) zero uncertainty may be reached using different tactics. The intrinsic difficulty of the problem is defined by its structure. Theoretically, the amount of information given by the answer to a certain question depends on that question in that problem. Therefore, the same answer to the same question does not always reduce uncertainty by the same amount. Two figures are used to illustrate the structure of problems, and the total uncertainty of the problems is defined in terms of the number of final branches of the logical tree. (RL)