Visual Scan Patterns in Tower Control: Foundations for an Instructor Support Tool

• Although where to look, when, and in what order is crucial for situation awareness and task performance in tower control, instructors are lacking support systems that can help them understand operators’ visual scan behaviours. As a way forward, this paper investigates the existence and characteristics of visual scan patterns in tower control and explores a novel support tool that can help instructors in searching for and exploring these patterns. First, eye-tracking data from two controllers were collected in a high-fidelity tower simulator. Second, a workshop was conducted with three instructors to discuss specific scan patterns that can be expected in relation to the approach scenarios used in the eye-tracking data collection. Six template visual scan patterns were identified during the workshop. Finally, an interactive visual sequence mining tool was used to identify and explore instances of the template scan patterns in the recorded eye-tracking data. Four of these could be detected using the tool: runway scans, landing clearance, touchdown and landing roll, and phases of visual focus. The identification of template scan patterns provides additional insight for formalising controllers’ visual work in tower control. The ability to detect and explore visual scan patterns in the proposed tool shows promise for improving instructors’ understanding of controllers’ visual scan behaviours, and for improving training effectiveness.

Ämnesord

TEKNIK OCH TEKNOLOGIER  -- Maskinteknik -- Produktionsteknik, arbetsvetenskap och ergonomi (hsv//swe)

ENGINEERING AND TECHNOLOGY  -- Mechanical Engineering -- Production Engineering, Human Work Science and Ergonomics (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Automation

Training

Eye-tracking

Air Traffic Control

Sequence mining

Visual perception

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