Propriétés, objets, procédures: Les réseaux sémantiques d'action appliqués à la représentation des dispositifs techniques.

We developed a Semantic Of Action Network Model (SOAN) to study how people understand and solve tasks, based on instructions, materials and knowledge that we supposed is activated from long term memory. SOAN models the subject's understanding by describing representations of situations. SOAN has similar objectives as Schema 's Based Models such as SAM (Schank & Abelson, 1977), Rules Based Models such as Understand (Simon & Hayes, 1979), Propositional and Rules Based Models such as Act (Anderson, 1983), and Connexionist Models of Procedures such as Network (Mannes & Kintsch, 1991). The SOAN program that realizes the knowledge description that fits the subject's representation is based on Procope formalism (Poitrenaud, 1 995) that allows factorizing the properties and procedures that objects have in common in order to determine hierarchies of categories, according to simple and multiple inheritance principles. This article is a survey of the research that we have conducted in cognitive ergonomics using Procope formalism, mainly to study how users understand and use unfamiliar technical devices based on the representations of technical devices with which they are familiar.