L'anticipation et sa représentation dans les interfaces homme-système en aéronautique : une approche d'ingénierie cognitique

Civil aviation pursues the objective of moving people or goods through the air with an optimal level of safety. For more than thirty years, despite a stricter and stricter regulatory framework and highly reliable automation, the ratio between performance and acceptable risk is not improving anymore.Human factors are a major action lever to break this glass floor. In the constrained context of aviation, designing tools aiming at assisting pilots’ cognition is thus a promising direction. Anticipation has been identified central in the process of cognitive resources management. In a human factors engineering approach, we undertook the design of an anticipation support tool involving pilots at each step of the development.From an activity analysis performed on the basis of in-cockpit recordings and interviews we constructed a model of the actual pilots’ activity during the descent and approach phases on Rio de Janeiro airport. The state of the art highlighted the key elements related to anticipation which could take benefit of a preliminary experiment. Experimental results brought together with our hypotheses about how anticipation works completed the requirements of the functional core of our anticipation support tool. A dynamic planning algorithm was then designed and implemented within ASAP (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning), Thales Avionics’ proof of concept. 36 commercial pilots took part to its evaluation in a simulated environment.L'anticipation et sa représentation dans les interfaces homme-système en aéronautique : une approche d'ingénierie cognitique Directeur de recherche : Pr. Bruno Vallespir/D. Pierre-Alexandre Favier Soutenue le : 18/09/2013 Devant la commission d'examen formée de : M. Régis MOLLARD Professeur, Université Paris V Rapporteur M. Julien CEGARRAL’aéronautique civile commerciale poursuit l’objectif du déplacement de biens ou de personnes, par les airs, en maintenant un niveau optimal de sécurité. Depuis plus de trente ans, en dépit de cadres normatifs de plus en plus stricts et d’automatismes de plus en plus performants, le rapport entre performance visée et risque encouru ne progresse plus.Le facteur humain constitue un levier d’action majeur pour franchir ce plancher de verre. Dans le cadre contraint de l’aéronautique, la conception d’outils visant à assister la cognition des pilotes est ainsi une direction d’avenir. L’anticipation a été identifiée comme un processus central dans la gestion des ressources cognitives. Dans une démarche de cognitique, nous avons ainsi entrepris la conception d’un outil d’aide à l’anticipation en impliquant des pilotes à chaque étape des développements.D’une analyse de l’activité sur la base d’enregistrements en cockpit et d’entretiens, nous avons construit un modèle de l’activité réelle des pilotes lors de la descente et l’approche sur l’aéroport de Rio de Janeiro. L’étude bibliographique mit en lumière des points critiques relevant de l’anticipation et nécessitant une expérimentation préliminaire. Les résultats expérimentaux conciliés à nos hypothèses de compréhension de l’anticipation achevèrent le cahier des charges du cœur fonctionnel de notre outil d’aide à l’anticipation. Un algorithme de planification dynamique exploitant notre modèle de l’activité fut conçu et implémenté au sein d’ASAP (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning) le démonstrateur de concept industriel de Thales Avionics. 36 pilotes civils commerciaux participèrent enfin à son évaluation en simulateur

The anticipation process and its representation in human-systems interfaces in the context of civil aviation : a cognitics engineering approach

L’aéronautique civile commerciale poursuit l’objectif du déplacement de biens ou de personnes, par les airs, en maintenant un niveau optimal de sécurité. Depuis plus de trente ans, en dépit de cadres normatifs de plus en plus stricts et d’automatismes de plus en plus performants, le rapport entre performance visée et risque encouru ne progresse plus.Le facteur humain constitue un levier d’action majeur pour franchir ce plancher de verre. Dans le cadre contraint de l’aéronautique, la conception d’outils visant à assister la cognition des pilotes est ainsi une direction d’avenir. L’anticipation a été identifiée comme un processus central dans la gestion des ressources cognitives. Dans une démarche de cognitique, nous avons ainsi entrepris la conception d’un outil d’aide à l’anticipation en impliquant des pilotes à chaque étape des développements.D’une analyse de l’activité sur la base d’enregistrements en cockpit et d’entretiens, nous avons construit un modèle de l’activité réelle des pilotes lors de la descente et l’approche sur l’aéroport de Rio de Janeiro. L’étude bibliographique mit en lumière des points critiques relevant de l’anticipation et nécessitant une expérimentation préliminaire. Les résultats expérimentaux conciliés à nos hypothèses de compréhension de l’anticipation achevèrent le cahier des charges du cœur fonctionnel de notre outil d’aide à l’anticipation. Un algorithme de planification dynamique exploitant notre modèle de l’activité fut conçu et implémenté au sein d’ASAP (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning) le démonstrateur de concept industriel de Thales Avionics. 36 pilotes civils commerciaux participèrent enfin à son évaluation en simulateur.Civil aviation pursues the objective of moving people or goods through the air with an optimal level of safety. For more than thirty years, despite a stricter and stricter regulatory framework and highly reliable automation, the ratio between performance and acceptable risk is not improving anymore.Human factors are a major action lever to break this glass floor. In the constrained context of aviation, designing tools aiming at assisting pilots’ cognition is thus a promising direction. Anticipation has been identified central in the process of cognitive resources management. In a human factors engineering approach, we undertook the design of an anticipation support tool involving pilots at each step of the development.From an activity analysis performed on the basis of in-cockpit recordings and interviews we constructed a model of the actual pilots’ activity during the descent and approach phases on Rio de Janeiro airport. The state of the art highlighted the key elements related to anticipation which could take benefit of a preliminary experiment. Experimental results brought together with our hypotheses about how anticipation works completed the requirements of the functional core of our anticipation support tool. A dynamic planning algorithm was then designed and implemented within ASAP (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning), Thales Avionics’ proof of concept. 36 commercial pilots took part to its evaluation in a simulated environment

The anticipation process and its representation in human-systems interfaces in the context of civil aviation : a cognitics engineering approach

L’aéronautique civile commerciale poursuit l’objectif du déplacement de biens ou de personnes, par les airs, en maintenant un niveau optimal de sécurité. Depuis plus de trente ans, en dépit de cadres normatifs de plus en plus stricts et d’automatismes de plus en plus performants, le rapport entre performance visée et risque encouru ne progresse plus.Le facteur humain constitue un levier d’action majeur pour franchir ce plancher de verre. Dans le cadre contraint de l’aéronautique, la conception d’outils visant à assister la cognition des pilotes est ainsi une direction d’avenir. L’anticipation a été identifiée comme un processus central dans la gestion des ressources cognitives. Dans une démarche de cognitique, nous avons ainsi entrepris la conception d’un outil d’aide à l’anticipation en impliquant des pilotes à chaque étape des développements.D’une analyse de l’activité sur la base d’enregistrements en cockpit et d’entretiens, nous avons construit un modèle de l’activité réelle des pilotes lors de la descente et l’approche sur l’aéroport de Rio de Janeiro. L’étude bibliographique mit en lumière des points critiques relevant de l’anticipation et nécessitant une expérimentation préliminaire. Les résultats expérimentaux conciliés à nos hypothèses de compréhension de l’anticipation achevèrent le cahier des charges du cœur fonctionnel de notre outil d’aide à l’anticipation. Un algorithme de planification dynamique exploitant notre modèle de l’activité fut conçu et implémenté au sein d’ASAP (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning) le démonstrateur de concept industriel de Thales Avionics. 36 pilotes civils commerciaux participèrent enfin à son évaluation en simulateur.Civil aviation pursues the objective of moving people or goods through the air with an optimal level of safety. For more than thirty years, despite a stricter and stricter regulatory framework and highly reliable automation, the ratio between performance and acceptable risk is not improving anymore.Human factors are a major action lever to break this glass floor. In the constrained context of aviation, designing tools aiming at assisting pilots’ cognition is thus a promising direction. Anticipation has been identified central in the process of cognitive resources management. In a human factors engineering approach, we undertook the design of an anticipation support tool involving pilots at each step of the development.From an activity analysis performed on the basis of in-cockpit recordings and interviews we constructed a model of the actual pilots’ activity during the descent and approach phases on Rio de Janeiro airport. The state of the art highlighted the key elements related to anticipation which could take benefit of a preliminary experiment. Experimental results brought together with our hypotheses about how anticipation works completed the requirements of the functional core of our anticipation support tool. A dynamic planning algorithm was then designed and implemented within ASAP (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning), Thales Avionics’ proof of concept. 36 commercial pilots took part to its evaluation in a simulated environment

Feedback on the Use of Matb-Ii Task for Modeling of Cognitive Control Levels Through Psycho-Physiological Biosignals

Modeling individuals’ cognitive control levels in operational situations is a major challenge for safety in aeronautical industry. Standardized experimental tasks - as the Multi-Attribute Task Battery II (MATB-II) - are dedicated to such a challenge that can be faced using psycho-physiological biosignals. These biosignals are known to be sensitive to cognitive workload, performance, and expertise that are intricate features of MATB-II subtasks. Thus, it remained necessary to investigate whether these features could be set to ensure controlled experimental conditions. Two groups (15 experts in time-pressured decision making and 13 novices) completed 3 MATB-II sub-tasks (tracking, monitoring, and resource management tasks). Biosignals accounting for autonomic nervous system activity were measured continuously, as objective markers of cognition. Confrontation between performance data and (objective and subjective) cognitive markers reported contrasting perspectives regarding the exploitation of MATB-II as a pertinent tool to insure controlled experimental conditions in the context of cognitive control characterization

Developing Asap (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning)

The 2009 A320 ditching on the Hudson River revealed to the public that critical decision-making ability was a key asset for pilots. Situation awareness and workload management are two key elements as well as the ability to anticipate how the situation will evolve. Thales Avionics is funding research through its HF research Lab (HEAL) on HMI facilitating pilot anticipation. This presentation covers a literature review on anticipation so as to develop a model of anticipation in a realistic flying task. Analyzing the concept of anticipation leads us to consider it as a metacognitive process relying on cognitive resource management, situation awareness and time management, using abstract representations. After reviewing these concepts, we focus on time management and anticipation. It reveals a closed loop mechanism inspired from the reafference principle. This will be the basis for a HMI based on a model of anticipation in flight

Developing Asap (Anticipation Support for Aeronautical Planning)

The 2009 A320 ditching on the Hudson River revealed to the public that critical decision-making ability was a key asset for pilots. Situation awareness and workload management are two key elements as well as the ability to anticipate how the situation will evolve. Thales Avionics is funding research through its HF research Lab (HEAL) on HMI facilitating pilot anticipation. This presentation covers a literature review on anticipation so as to develop a model of anticipation in a realistic flying task. Analyzing the concept of anticipation leads us to consider it as a metacognitive process relying on cognitive resource management, situation awareness and time management, using abstract representations. After reviewing these concepts, we focus on time management and anticipation. It reveals a closed loop mechanism inspired from the reafference principle. This will be the basis for a HMI based on a model of anticipation in flight

Compared Evaluation Of B-Alert’s Encephalographic Workload Metrics Using An Operational Video Game Setup.

International audienceWhen it comes to operational human factors studies, the use of a number ofdifferent means (psychophysiological, questionnaires, performance indexes) tocomplete expert behavioral observations allows specialists to issue practicalrecommendations despite of the variability of the few operators involved. When itcomes to mental workload, literature has identified several different physiologicalways to assess it. We used Heart Rate Variability (HRV) and pupillometry forprevious works (ISAP’11, ’13) and both have strong limitations: HRV can onlybe analyzed over 5-minutes time periods and pupil dilation is subject to lightvariability.During this study, we tested the electroencephalography B-Alert X10 system(Advance Brain Monitoring, Inc.) mental workload metrics. We set up anexperiment on a video game in real life conditions in order to evaluate thereliability of this index. Participants were asked to play a video game withdifferent levels of goal (easy vs. hard) as we measured subjective, behavioral andphysiological indexes (B-Alert mental workload index, pupillometry) of mentalworkload. Our results indicate that, although most of the measure point toward thesame direction, the B-Alert metrics fails to give a clear indication of the mentalworkload state of the participants. The use of the B-Alert workload index alone isnot accurate enough to assess an operator mental workload condition withcertainty. Further evaluations of this measure need to be done. As we observed ina previous study, pupil dilation is a reliable index of mental workload as itcorrelates significantly with most measures