NASA Logo

NTRS

NTRS - NASA Technical Reports Server

Back to Results
Design of a cooperative problem-solving system for en-route flight planning: An empirical evaluationBoth optimization techniques and expert systems technologies are popular approaches for developing tools to assist in complex problem-solving tasks. Because of the underlying complexity of many such tasks, however, the models of the world implicitly or explicitly embedded in such tools are often incomplete and the problem-solving methods fallible. The result can be 'brittleness' in situations that were not anticipated by the system designers. To deal with this weakness, it has been suggested that 'cooperative' rather than 'automated' problem-solving systems be designed. Such cooperative systems are proposed to explicitly enhance the collaboration of the person (or a group of people) and the computer system. This study evaluates the impact of alternative design concepts on the performance of 30 airline pilots interacting with such a cooperative system designed to support en-route flight planning. The results clearly demonstrate that different system design concepts can strongly influence the cognitive processes and resultant performances of users. Based on think-aloud protocols, cognitive models are proposed to account for how features of the computer system interacted with specific types of scenarios to influence exploration and decision making by the pilots. The results are then used to develop recommendations for guiding the design of cooperative systems.
Document ID
19950054330
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Reprint (Version printed in journal)
Authors
Layton, Charles
(Galaxy Scientific Corporation Atlanta, Georgia, United States)
Smith, Philip J.
(Ohio State University Columbus, Ohio, United States)
Mc Coy, C. Elaine
(Ohio University Athens, Ohio, United States)
Date Acquired
August 16, 2013
Publication Date
March 1, 1994
Publication Information
Publication: Human Factors
Volume: 36
Issue: 1
ISSN: 0018-7208
Subject Category
Man/System Technology And Life Support
Accession Number
95A85929
Funding Number(s)
CONTRACT_GRANT: NCC2-615
CONTRACT_GRANT: NCA2-701
Distribution Limits
Public
Copyright
Other

Available Downloads

There are no available downloads for this record.
No Preview Available