Cockpit management : beware of task forgetting even at moderate workloads
conference paper
Task forgetting is the failure to do a task in time. Disaster may, or may not, ensue depending on the criticality of the task that is forgotten. Poor task (situation) awareness is a necessary precursor of task forgetting. A simulated process-control task consisting of a permanent and an incidental task is introduced as a vehicle to study forgetting of the permanent task. The first study (n=24) addressed the mental cost of attention switching between tasks. The conclusion was that the switching cost was low, at least for half of the incident-solving task. The second study let 59 participants work in shifts of 4 hours. Task forgetting occurred despite instructions and warnings. It was observed among 56% of the participants; the overall probability of task forgetting was 3% for any epoch of 3 minutes. SWAT mental workload, reported at the end of each incident, was slightly below "moderate". The conclusion was that high mental workload is not a necessary condition for task forgetting (moderate or lower workloads are no protection against task forgetting). The paper ends with measures for prevention.
Taakvergeten is waneer een kritische taak te laat wordt uitgevoerd. Een onderzoek met 59 deelnemers laat zien dat dir ook bij matige werkbelasting optreedt.
TNO Identifier
9550
Source title
Proceedings of the International Symposium on Aviation Psychology, 1998, Vienna
Pages
501 - 506
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