Eye-Tracking Analysis of Near-Term Terminal Automation for Arrival Coordination

Abstract

Sponsored by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), The MITRE Corporation’s Center for Advanced Aviation System Development (CAASD) developed the Relative Position Indicator (RPI) concept. RPI is an automation concept to aid air traffic controllers in coordinating arrival traffic, reducing the need to vector for spacing during merging operations and, thus, retaining the benefits of Area Navigation (RNAV) and Required Navigation Performance (RNP) procedures. Validation activities involving an RPI research prototype have shown benefits in achieving more efficient merging and spacing of aircraft. Since the RPI concept makes additional information available on the situation display that can be referenced by the controller, an understanding of this information presence upon controller scan behavior was desired. As part of a Human-In-The-Loop (HITL) simulation of Denver operations conducted by CAASD, a comparison of two scenarios was made to evaluate the change in controller attentional allocation , as measured by an eye-tracking capability, when RPI is introduced. The simulated traffic consisted of predominantly RNAV operations and was managed with and without RPI automation. Participants were air traffic control specialists at Denver Terminal Radar Approach Control (TRACON) facility. Given the design of the RPI tool, two behavior changes were anticipated; 1) an increase of time spent scanning the primary flow of a merging flow geometry and 2) an increase of time spent scanning farther ahead or in advance of the merge point location. The eye-tracking analysis provides a preliminary indication that RPI does affect air traffic controller visual scanning patterns. Although the magnitude of change does not seem concerning , additional evaluation should be pursued to understand the impact of this change.