Use of Cognitive Function Modeling with Complex Systems

Systems and weapons platforms of the future are going to place more cognitive demands on the operators; conventional task analyses were designed for physical tasks, not for cognitive tasks. Furthermore, future systems will permit dramatically reduced manpower; this will require even more care in function allocation, and will further increase the cognitive demands on the operators. We propose to sythesize new techniques of Cognitive Task Analysis (CTA) with Operator Function Modeling, to provide a new methodology for capturing the cognitive requirements of complex tasks. We can consider this hybrid methodology as Cognitive Function Modeling. The research effort will develop a Cognitive Function Modeling methodology, and then demonstrate its feasibility by applying it to an actual Navy system. The applications will show whether the fusion of CTA and Operator Function Modeling was successful, and will also indicate ways of improving the methodology. The Cognitive Function Modeling technique should enable us to make informed judgments regarding function allocation, to assess the cognitive complexity of tasks, and to direct the design of human computer interfaces for new systems.