Date of Award

Spring 2004

Document Type

Thesis - Open Access

Degree Name

Master of Science in Human Factors & Systems

Department

Human Factors and Systems

Committee Chair

Christina M. Frederick

Committee Member

Jon French

Committee Member

John Griffin

Abstract

Prospective memory, or memory for future intents, is an important part of everyone's daily life. Air traffic controllers whose jobs are based in an environment that taxes their memory resources for extended periods of time rely on this type of memory. Controllers objectives often change based on incoming information and the amount of traffic they are controlling. It is important to investigate how controllers form intentions for future events, what processes facilitate retrieval of this information, and establish what influence experience may have. This study proposes to assess controllers in an air traffic scenario by employing a cognitive task analysis to determine when intentions are formed. The experimenter expects that controllers who form explicit intentions for specified future actions will perform better and that experience will facilitate intention formation.

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