Agent-based Reduction of Information Density (ARID)

Information overload and cluttered user interfaces cause decreased situational awareness and lowered performance of the human operators. Irrelevant data increases searching times for tasks requiring the identification of threats, causing delayed decisions. Cognitive burden on the user increases as displays become more cluttered, which results in increased operator stress leading to poorer decisions. 21st Century Systems, Incorporated (21CSI) is pleased to propose to research and develop an intelligent agent-based system for the automatic de-cluttering of representational UAV command and control interfaces. 21CSI’s Agent-based Reduction of Information Density (ARID) concept encompasses the development of an ontological representation of the problem domain and user interface elements, design of a set of intelligent agents, and the development of a proof-of-concept implementation to demonstrate the effectiveness of the system. Intelligent agents can reduce the cognitive load imposed upon an operator by de-emphasizing those aspects of a display that can be inferred as less-important to the mission goals. Similarly, an intelligent agent can draw the operator’s attention to high-priority events or situations. ARID agents will be based upon ontological reasoning and feedback learning mechanisms to deliver a significant improvement over the simplistic rules-based systems that represent the current state of the art.