Aircraft Importance and Its Relevance to Situation Awareness

Details

• Creators:
  Gronlund, S. D. ; Ohrt, Daryl D. ; Perry, Jennifer L. ; Manning, Carol A. ; Dougherty, Michael R.
• Corporate Creators:
  United States. Office of Aerospace Medicine
• Corporate Contributors:
  University of Oklahoma. Dept. of Psychology
• Subject/TRT Terms:
  • Air traffic
  • Air traffic controllers
  • Aircraft
  • Enroute traffic control
  • Ground speed
  • Memory
  • Aviation
  • Operations and Traffic Management
  • Vehicles and Equipment
• Publication/ Report Number:
  DOT/FAA/AM-98/16
• Resource Type:
  Tech Report
• Geographical Coverage:
  Oklahoma ; United States
• Corporate Publisher:
  United States. Department of Transportation. Federal Aviation Administration
• Abstract:
  We tested en route air traffic controllers (currently serving as instructors at the FAA Academy) to determine what they remember about the aircraft in their sector. We focused on memory for flight data (especially aircraft altitude and ground speed) and the position of the aircraft on the radar screen. Aircraft importance affected memory for flight data but not the highly accurate recall of the radar position of the aircraft. We hypothesize that controllers use their excellent memory for aircraft position to classify aircraft as important (potential traffic) or not, and better remember flight data about important aircraft (in particular, their exact altitude). The results have implications for improving techniques to assess situation awareness and interfaces to support it.
• Format:
  PDF
• Download URL:
  https://rosap.ntl.bts.gov/view/dot/40468/dot_40468_DS1.pdf
• File Type:
  [PDF - 87.86 KB]
• Collection(s):
  US Transportation Collection ; FAA Civil Aerospace Medical Institute
• Main Document Checksum:
  urn:sha256:725fcc0389e6a511cef92047aa5af31cc4c61d8d8db8f6b243ff5a1c78d328db