ACT-R Model Builder

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SKILL.md

ACT-R Model Builder

Purpose

This skill encodes expert knowledge for constructing computational cognitive models within the ACT-R (Adaptive Control of Thought -- Rational) architecture. It provides guidance on chunk type definition, production rule authoring, subsymbolic parameter selection with empirically validated defaults, model fitting workflows, and validation procedures. A general-purpose programmer would not know the architecture constraints, parameter defaults, or model validation standards without specialized cognitive modeling training.

When to Use This Skill

  • Designing a new ACT-R model for a cognitive task (memory retrieval, decision-making, skill acquisition)
  • Setting subsymbolic parameters and understanding their theoretical justification
  • Structuring chunk types and production rules for a specific experimental paradigm
  • Fitting an ACT-R model to behavioral data (RT, accuracy)
  • Validating a model via parameter recovery, cross-validation, or qualitative predictions
  • Choosing between ACT-R 7.x (Lisp) and pyactr (Python) for implementation

Research Planning Protocol

Before executing the domain-specific steps below, you MUST:

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