Physiological Assessment of Pilot Workload in the A-7 Aircraft

• Main Authors: Lindholm,Ernest, Sisson,Norwood, Miller,Milton J, Toldy,Margaret E
• Format: Report
• Language: English
• Subjects: A-7 AIRCRAFT; AIRCRAFT; BLOOD PRESSURE; COMPUTER PROGRAMS; CUES(STIMULI); FLIGHT; HEART RATE; Human Factors Engineering & Man Machine System; INFLIGHT; LOW ALTITUDE; MAN MACHINE SYSTEMS; MULTIVARIATE ANALYSIS; PE62205F; PHYSIOLOGICAL EFFECTS; PILOT STUDIES; PILOT WORKLOAD; PILOTS; QUALITY; RESPIRATION; SENSITIVITY; Stress Physiology; VISUAL PERCEPTION; WORKLOAD; WUAFHRL11230358

Custom hardware and software were developed to permit the recording, in flight, of as many as 23 aircraft parameters and the heart and respiration activity of a pilot flying an A-7 aircraft. G-forces, altitude, and velocity were systematically manipulated in three environments which differed with respect to the quality of visual cues for depth perception. The results showed that heart rate was most sensitive to changes in altitude, somewhat less sensitive to changes in velocity, and least sensitive to G-forces. Heart rate was also sensitive to the visual cue quality of the environment, but only for maneuvers performed at low altitude. Respiration activity covaried with changes in aircraft parameters, but this relationship could be detected only by multivariate analysis techniques. In some cases, heart rate did not show the predicted increases, and it is suggested that rapid changes in blood pressure would be valuable to assess in future investigations. Keywords: Man machine systems; Work load. Prepared in cooperation with Interface Research Associates, Inc., Scottsdate, AZ.