Situation awareness

About: Situation awareness is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 7380 publications have been published within this topic receiving 108695 citations. The topic is also known as: SA & situational awareness.

A Descriptive Framework of Workspace Awareness for Real-Time Groupware

Abstract: Supporting awareness of others is an idea that holds promise for improving the usability of real-time distributed groupware. However, there is little principled information available about awareness that can be used by groupware designers. In this article, we develop a descriptive theory of awareness for the purpose of aiding groupware design, focusing on one kind of group awareness called i>workspace awareness. We focus on how small groups perform generation and execution tasks in medium-sized shared workspaces – tasks where group members frequently shift between individual and shared activities during the work session. We have built a three-part framework that examines the concept of workspace awareness and that helps designers understand the concept for purposes of designing awareness support in groupware. The framework sets out elements of knowledge that make up workspace awareness, perceptual mechanisms used to maintain awareness, and the ways that people use workspace awareness in collaboration. The framework also organizes previous research on awareness and extends it to provide designers with a vocabulary and a set of ground rules for analysing work situations, for comparing awareness devices, and for explaining evaluation results. The basic structure of the theory can be used to describe other kinds of awareness that are important to the usability of groupware.

Designing for Situation Awareness: An Approach to User-Centered Design

Abstract: Understanding Situation Awareness in System Design User-Centered Design Who Is This Book For? Why Do We Need User-Centered Design? What Does User-Centered Design Mean? Principles for User-Centered Design Situation Awareness: The Key to User-Centered Design What Is Situation Awareness? SA Defined Time as a Part of SA Situation Awareness as a Product of the Process Perception and Attention Working Memory Mental Models, Schema, and Scripts Goals and SA Expectations Automaticity and SA Summary SA Demons: The Enemies of Situation Awareness Attentional Tunneling Requisite Memory Trap Workload, Anxiety, Fatigue, and Other Stressors Data Overload Misplaced Salience Complexity Creep Errant Mental Models Out-of-the-Loop Syndrome Summary Design Process Systems Development Life Cycle User Interface Design Process Situation Awareness-Oriented Design Creating Situation Awareness-Oriented Designs Determining SA Requirements Goal-Directed Task Analysis Methodology Overview Interviews Determining the Preliminary Goal Structure Future Interviews Interview Issues Organizational Tips GDTA Validation Principles of Designing for SA From Theory to Design Case Study: SA-Oriented Design Confidence and Uncertainty in SA and Decision Making Uncertainty Types and Sources of Uncertainty Role of Confidence in Linking SA and Decision Making Management of Uncertainty Design Principles for Representing Uncertainty Dealing with Complexity Simplified View of Complexity Design Principles for Taming Complexity Alarms, Diagnosis, and SA An Alarming Practice Processing Alarms in the Context of SA Principles for the Design of Alarm Systems Automation and Situation Awareness Automation: A Help or a Hindrance? Out-of-the-Loop Syndrome Automation and Level of Understanding Decision Support Dilemma New Approaches to Automation Principles for Designing Automated Systems Designing to Support SA for Multiple and Distributed Operators Team Operations SA in Teams What Is Shared SA? Critical Factors Affecting SA in Teams SA in Distributed Teams SA Breakdowns in Teams Design Principles for Supporting Team Operations Unmanned and Remotely Operated Vehicles Unmanned Vehicles for Many Uses Classes of Unmanned Vehicle Control Human Error in Unmanned Vehicle Operations Situation Awareness Requirements for Unmanned Vehicle Operations Challenges for SA in Remote Operations Factors for Effective Design of Unmanned Vehicle Tasks and Systems Summary SA Oriented Training Need for Training to Enhance SA Challenges for Novices Mental Models Form a Key Mechanism for Expertise Schema of Prototypical Situations or Patterns Critical Skills for SA Examples of SA Deficits in Novices Training Approaches for Improving Situation Awareness Summary Completing the Design Cycle Evaluating Design Concepts for SA Indirect Measures of Situation Awareness Direct Measures of Situation Awareness Measuring Team SA Case Study Summary Applying SA-Oriented Design to Complex Systems Combating the Enemies of Situation Awareness SA-Oriented Design Synergy System Evaluation Future Directions Appendix A: Goal-Directed Task Analysis for Commercial Airline Pilots References Index

Level of automation effects on performance, situation awareness and workload in a dynamic control task

Abstract: Various levels of automation (LOA) designating the degree of human operator and computer control were explored within the context of a dynamic control task as a means of improving overall human/machine performance. Automated systems have traditionally been explored as binary function allocations; either the human or the machine is assigned to a given task. More recently, intermediary levels of automation have been discussed as a means of maintaining operator involvement in system performance, leading to improvements in situation awareness and reductions in out-of-the-loop performance problems. A LOA taxonomy applicable to a wide range of psychomotor and cognitive tasks is presented here. The taxonomy comprises various schemes of generic control system function allocations. The functions allocated to a human operator and/or computer included monitoring displays, generating processing options, selecting an 'optimal' option and implementing that option. The impact of the LOA taxonomy was assessed within a dynamic and complex cognitive control task by measuring its effect on human/system performance, situation awareness and workload. Thirty subjects performed simulation trials involving various levels of automation. Several automation failures occurred and out-of-the-loop performance decrements were assessed. Results suggest that, in terms of performance, human operators benefit most from automation of the implementation portion of the task, but only under normal operating conditions; in contrast, removal of the operator from task implementation is detrimental to performance recovery if the automated system fails. Joint human/system option generation significantly degraded performance in comparison to human or automated option generation alone. Lower operator workload and higher situation awareness were observed under automation of the decision making portion of the task (i.e. selection of options), although human/system performance was only slightly improved. The implications of these findings for the design of automated systems are discussed.

Error Reduction and Performance Improvement in the Emergency Department through Formal Teamwork Training: Evaluation Results of the MedTeams Project

Abstract: The MedTeams project is a translational research effort to apply crew resource management (CRM) behavioral principles developed in aviation to emergency medical care. Hospital emergency departments share many of the same characteristics with workplaces where CRM is effective, such as time-stress, dispersed and complex information, multiple players, and high-stakes outcomes. Preliminary observations in emergency departments (ED) established that the same CRM behaviors employed by highly effective aviation teams could be useful in the ED (Weiner, Kanki, and Helmreich 1993; Simon, Morey, and Locke 1997). A retrospective review of ED closed claims revealed that failure to engage in one or more of these teamwork behaviors was associated with an adverse event and indemnity payments. In 43 percent of the cases reviewed, teamwork behaviors would have prevented or mitigated the adverse event had they been applied (Risser, Rice et al. 1999). Similar analyses attribute about 80 percent of anesthesia mishaps to human error and 70 percent of commercial aviation accidents to crew errors (Gardner-Bonneau 1993; Taggart 1994). Crew training has led to reductions in aviation mishaps beyond those produced by improvements in equipment and technology. The aviation community began introducing CRM training two decades ago and it is now required for all military and commercial U.S. aviation crews and air carriers operating internationally (Helmreich and Foushee 1993; Helmreich 1997). The basic principle of CRM is that crew communication and coordination behaviors are identifiable, teachable, and applicable to high-stakes environments. An additional principle is that those behaviors, although seen spontaneously, are not practiced reliably, regularly, or well unless specific training and reinforcement has established them. Specific CRM behaviors have been identified through experimentation and observation of high-reliability teams in demanding, time-stressed environments such as combat aviation and naval command and control centers (Leedom and Simon 1995; McIntyre and Salas 1995). Crew resource management training has been shown to be effective in these environments and is being extended into other domains (Helmreich and Foushee 1993; Salas et al. 1999). Finally, an essential principle of CRM is that a team needs to be formally established for teamwork behaviors to be effective. In contrast to the notion of a team as any loosely coordinated group of caregivers and support staff, the formal teamwork structure of this study stipulates that a team be made up of between 3 to 10 members. A team is composed of physicians, nurses, and technicians who are organized for a shift. The number of designated teams for a shift depends on factors such as staffing levels and patient volume. From these larger teams, ad hoc teams are formed to respond to emergent events such as resuscitations. In this model, teamwork is sustained by a shared set of teamwork skills rather than permanent assignments that carry over from day to day. Teamwork theory development has focused on input variables affecting team functioning such as task, work environment, and team member characteristics (Salas et al. 1992), what and how to train (Salas and Cannon-Bowers 2001), and outcome constructs of teamwork effectiveness (McIntyre, Salas 1995). Explanatory mechanisms of team processes exist in the form of constructs such as situational awareness and shared mental models, but relating team processes to work productivity outcomes has been limited by measurement difficulties with these constructs. Because this study examined the applicability of CRM to health care, a goal of this study was to generate a set of testable teamwork process–outcome propositions for future healthcare research. With respect to the training intervention, we sought to gain insight into the effectiveness of the training materials and methods, and features of the curriculum that needed revision. In addition, we sought to determine if the training intervention changed staff attitudes and behaviors and had an impact on patient care. These complementary perspectives are referred to as formative and summative evaluation in the education research literature (Bloom, Hastings, and Madaus 1971). The first objective of this study was to adapt an aviation-oriented teamwork curriculum to the particular circumstances of EDs by developing and then implementing a training curriculum (Emergency Team Coordination Course [ETCC]) organized around five team dimensions (maintain team structure and climate, apply problem-solving strategies, communicate with the team, execute plans and manage workload, and improve team skills) (Risser, Rice et al. 1999; Risser, Simon et al. 1999). The second objective was to evaluate the effectiveness of the intervention with measures developed to address three outcome constructs: Team Behaviors, Attitudes and Opinions, and ED Performance.

Situation awareness global assessment technique (SAGAT)

Abstract: Pilot-vehicle interface designs must be driven by the gaol of establishing and maintaining high pilot situation awareness. The situation-awareness global assessment technique (SAGAT), developed to assist in this process by providing an objective measure of pilot's situation awareness with any given aircraft design, is described. SAGAT is considered to represent a substantial improvement in the evaluation of pilot-vehicle interface designs, facilitating the development of cockpits which assist the pilot in surviving combat. A formal definition of situation awareness is presented a description of the SAGAT methology and a discussion of its validation. >