Research Project

Using Vision Language Models to Analyze Concept Maps

Use vision language models (VLMs) to analyze concept maps and other visualizations of complex systems. One application is to study how students represent and reason about social-ecological systems in engineering design.

Seed Project (Unfunded)Unfunded2025–2026SeedActiveOpen for Students

Research Question

Develop a dataset of concept maps and other visualizations of complex systems

Approach

  • Develop a dataset of concept maps and other visualizations of complex systems
  • Prototype VLM-based analysis pipelines for identifying elements and relationships
  • Evaluate against expert judgments and iterate on prompts and pipelines
  • Release a reproducible workflow and documentation