Title: Designing adaptive systems: selecting an invoking threshold to improve human performance

Authors: Christina F. Rusnock; Christopher D. Geiger

Addresses: Department of Systems Engineering and Management, Air Force Institute of Technology, 2950 Hobson Way, Bldg 640, Room 107B, Wright Patterson Air Force Base, OH 45433, USA ' Business Analytics and Industrial Engineering, Universal Orlando Resort, 1000 Universal Studios Plaza/B-110, Orlando, FL 32819, USA

Abstract: Previous adaptive automation design research has focussed on the decisions of how to automate, how much to automate, and what to automate. Another important factor that has not been widely considered is when to automate. As adaptive systems become more viable, the design decision of when to automate (i.e. the workload/taskload level that should be used to invoke the adaptive automation) will become increasing important. This research uses human performance simulation to analyse the impact of adaptive automation thresholds on operator workload and situation awareness. Through an unmanned ground and aerial vehicle case study using human trials and discrete-event simulation, this research reveals that the effectiveness of the adaptive automation requires a deliberate trade-off between performance, workload, and situation awareness goals.

Keywords: adaptive automation; human performance modelling; invoking threshold; mental workload; simulation; situation awareness.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHFE.2016.083503

International Journal of Human Factors and Ergonomics, 2016 Vol.4 No.3/4, pp.292 - 315

Received: 13 Jun 2016
Accepted: 29 Sep 2016

Published online: 08 Apr 2017 *

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