Visual analysis of arguments in video-based debates

Abstract

The ability to understand, process and evaluate arguments made by others and ourselves is important in many personal and professional spheres, such as political debates. However, developing an understanding and communicating with others is often limited to passive viewing, textual discussion on social media and comments on a newspaper website. The analysis of arguments might help in developing a better understanding, but this typically appears in written form, such as debate article written by journalists or experts on a newspaper. A growing number of argumentation tools favour diagram-based graphical representations to traditional text documents for argument analysis because arguments have non-linear structures that are difficult to convey simply through text. Such tools have been developed for different purposes such as education and decision analysis and are often used by experts in the field of argumentation and debate analysis. Despite the widespread use and development of argumentation systems, there is still little understanding of how to design and implement argumentation systems for non-experts in argumentation.

This thesis investigates how to design and implement Deb8, a tool that allows collaborative analysis of video-based debates. This thesis presents the results of three studies that uncover to what extent non-experts in argumentation understand and use Deb8, what argument concepts non-experts apply in their analyses and what role the graphical representation of arguments play in the analysis of video-based debates.

The findings presented in this thesis can guide the design of better argumentation systems and shed light on the areas of debate analysis and argument visualisation with a better understanding of how to design systems to help the general public to argue better.

Date of Award	15 Jun 2022
Original language	English
Awarding Institution	University of St Andrews
Supervisor	Aaron John Quigley (Supervisor), Miguel Nacenta (Supervisor) & Alice Toniolo (Supervisor)