The purpose of this paper is to describe experimental work conducted in the area of diagnostic radiology, with an emphasis on how perception and problem solving interact in this type of task. This work was part of a larger project whose goals included the development of an infomiation-processing model of visual interaction, and the subsequent design of an intelligent cooperative assistant for this domain.

Verbal protocol data was collected from eight radiologists (six residents and two experts) while they examined seven different computer-displayed chest x-rays. A brief overview of the methodology and analysis techniques is presented, together with specific results from one x-ray case. More general results are then discussed in the framework of issues important to the later modeling effort.