Title

Procedure And Dynamic Display Relocation On Performance In A Multitask Environment

Keywords

Adaptive-task allocation; Automation; Displays; Dynamic-interface configuration; Multitasking; Perceived workload

Abstract

In this paper, the responses of experienced professional pilots to change in interface configuration and differing automated invocation procedures were examined using a simulated flight-task environment. Performance was evaluated on three subtasks: two-dimensional compensatory tracking; fuel management; and systems monitoring. The status of automation, which was available for tracking and fuel management only, was conveyed by a change in display configuration represented by either a reduction in the size of the relevant display or by a reduction in size accompanied by its displacement to a peripheral spatial location. Combined with these interface-configuration changes were two forms of automation invocation procedure, which were pilot-initiated automation and system-initiated automation. Each was compared to a standard manual-control condition. Results indicated several response asymmetries. While tracking showed no effect for the location of the automated fuel-management display, fuel-management performance did reveal a significant effect, which favored the peripheral location of the automated tracking display. This display-location effect is thought to result from a general requirement for pilots to change their visual-scan pattern. The converse effect does not appear for fuel management and represents the continued primacy given by the pilots to tracking performance. System-initiated automation of fuel management, as a set condition, resulted in significantly better tracking performance, in both mean and variability measures, when compared to pilot-initiated automation. In the converse situation, involving the automation of the tracking subtask, a significant difference was also evident, but only in the variance measure of the fuel-management performance. The fuel-management variance for the pilot-initiated automation of tracking was significantly lower than that for the condition where the automation was enacted by the system. These results indicate that the automation-initiation process itself influences subsequent multitask performance. The present results support a general contention that the operator should initiate automation, except in circumstances in which the operator is for some reason incapacitated. © 2007 IEEE.

Publication Date

1-1-2007

Publication Title

IEEE Transactions on Systems, Man, and Cybernetics Part A:Systems and Humans

Volume

37

Issue

1

Number of Pages

47-57

Document Type

Article

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1109/TSMCA.2006.886341

Socpus ID

33845776613 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/33845776613

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