miscon:programming.variables.names-meaningful-to-machine · draft · trust low · v0.1.1 · kind misapplied-analogy

The computer understands variable names

The name of a variable tells the computer what it is for, so a variable called total will add things up and one called largest will hold the biggest value.

Stable URI: https://open-misconceptions.github.io/miscon-data/m/programming.variables.names-meaningful-to-machine
UUID: b34639bb-e7b4-400a-bd2a-ced15052078b
Domain: programming.variables
Level band: secondary, undergraduate
Locale: en
About: https://open-misconceptions.github.io/miscon-data/c/programming.variables.naming (Miscon)

Evidence patterns

Pattern 0: predict the value of a descriptively named variable that is never updated

predicts the value the name suggests rather than the value assigned

Item

largest = 0
for n in [4, 9, 2]:
    pass
print(largest)

Expected0

Response9

Discriminators

vs a slip. The prediction follows the name on every item, and renaming the variable to x changes the learner's answer. A slip does not depend on the name.

Relations

conflicts_with: Identifiers are labels with no meaning to the machine (external)
resolved_by: Identifiers are labels with no meaning to the machine (external)
The machine does exactly what the code says (external)
specializes: programming.execution.computer-infers-intent

Provenance

Origin: llm-drafted

Pea, R. D. (1986). Language-independent conceptual "bugs" in novice programming. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 2(1), 25-36. doi:10.2190/689T-1R2A-X4W4-29J2
Egocentrism bug: attributing interpretive intelligence to the machine.
Sorva, J. (2012). Visual Program Simulation in Introductory Programming Education (Doctoral dissertation, Aalto University). Appendix A catalogues introductory programming misconceptions from the literature. link
Kaczmarczyk, L. C., Petrick, E. R., East, J. P., & Herman, G. L. (2010). Identifying student misconceptions of programming. In Proceedings of the 41st ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE '10), 107-111. doi:10.1145/1734263.1734299

Drafted from the cited literature for the Open Misconceptions seed pack; statement, examples and discriminators are original text. Awaiting maintainer review.

Review status

Status draft, trust low (computed from the reviews below against the reviewer registry).

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Formats

Raw JSON
CASE 1.1 package (CFItem b34639bb-e7b4-400a-bd2a-ced15052078b)
Source on GitHub

Cite

miscon:programming.variables.names-meaningful-to-machine
https://open-misconceptions.github.io/miscon-data/m/programming.variables.names-meaningful-to-machine