Modeling Analyst Process of Transforming Data into Understanding

Increasing amounts of data and the development of new search tools put more emphasis on the role of information synthesis and mental model development for an intelligence analyst. The process employed by the analyst in researching a topic focuses on starting with unstructured data and creating a body of relevant knowledge that provides for an effective transfer of understanding. The objective of this study is to build a model of how a National Air and Space Intelligence Center (NASIC) analyst addresses a scenario task. The model looks at the decision process of searching for and evaluating information and determining relevancy. The model is applied to use of the baseline analyst tools as well as the addition of the Geospatial Open Search Toolkit (GOST) system.