Army Research Efforts in Human-Centered Design
Bernard M. Corona
Deputy Director, Battlefield Digitization
Human Research and Engineering Directorate
Army Research Laboratory
We are gathered to discuss and propose both intellectual and technical solutions for benefiting from the computational sciences "effant terrible" the "computer." The application of technology to provide people with form, fit and function in their relationship to machines (or complex systems) has been used on-and-off for centuries. A fine example is Roman infantry body armor (the lorica segimentata from the Augustian era) which was modular, standardized, and sized so that any set of components could be mixed and matched and assembled to accommodate the specific users. Historically in the U.S., the Union Army conducted anthropometric assessments to provide the basis of mass-producing uniforms, boots and accouterments.
This human-materiel perspective became more focused as Human Factors Engineering evolved as a discipline from the mid-1940's. The Army Air Force's efforts in crew station design and standardization were the antecedents of today's multiple paradigms associated with complex systems.
The Army has for five decades maintained a centralized laboratory for Human Factors Engineering practice. The organization provides basic research in areas such as vision, audition, perception, decision processes and performance modeling to mention a few. Coupled to this "basic research" are two supporting elements; applied research and technology integration-application. Applied research is closely allied with military users (concept formulators) and the Army's Research Development and Engineering Centers. The second area technology integration-application is personified by the MANPRINT management process and is allied closely with the military user and Army Project Managers and the materiel development and bureaucratic steps associated with the material development process.
More often than not the difference between the products of applied research and MANPRINT functions are blurred. Both aid in the identification of human system interactions, providing metrics for performance and worth. MANPRINT, however, brings a focus to the integration of technology and personnel selection, training, individual survivability, health and safety and finally field sustainment-product improvement. However, despite these advances in approaching human-centered systems, computational science products have received little if any in-depth attention; style manuals, screen alpha-numeric placement and menus have been "our" only products. Sadly, even these products lack standardization (particularly between applications and even within similar tools) and a system performance perspective.
In-the-main, current fielded computational-based systems are no more than curious adaptations of commercial computing metaphors.
Nineteen ninety six was a year of faith-finding as the Army embarked on a series of attempts to understand "Digitizing the Battlefield" and the role of the computer in its management:
The Army Research Laboratory was provided resources to investigate and provide both conceptual and functional products dealing with Advanced Sensors, Military Peculiar Telecommunication requirements and Multimedia-Multimodality Displays. I am going to discuss the display program.
We are about the business of providing innovative display systems to help soldiers visualize space, time, dynamic events, and manage information.
The computer with its one-half to one billion operations per second has become the collector and custodian of raw data from a universe of sensors (people and machines). The now familiar processor, monitor, keyboard-mouse, and complex mathematical programs represent the commercial state-of-the-art. Recently, this array has been augmented by voice, audio and touch modules. This complex, yet almost common place array, is poised for use by the military and proposed to supplant or assist in performing part or all manual soldier-to-staff functions (at various echelons of operation and control). This idea carried to its extreme would replace decision making by the command staff with various machine based intelligence agents or representations and would leave the commander as only the arbiter of information ambiguity. Whether you subscribe to this view, or not, clearly soldiers mistrust computer "intelligence" and find the current office metaphor of information access and manipulation tedious, mentally intensive and often confusing; it is frequently rejected by users as being counter-productive, and unsuitable for dynamic vehicular platforms. Making computer technology acceptable and useful to soldiers requires the development of a new metaphor and associated technology, one in which the computer fits easily into the soldiers natural way of thinking.
These notions of physical configuration, information management, and transfer, control and efficacy of information problems were recognized by the Army and challenged to change by the Broad Area Announcement for Display Research. The result of the challenge was the formation of this Federated Laboratory Consortium.
The Consortium has as a basic premise, the emphasis on intelligent Human Computer Interaction (HCI). Theoretically, this should result in hardware-software combinations that evolve from natural heuristic processes. Classical perceptions of HCI have to leap forward intellectually to envision Soldier Battlespace Interactions (SBI) where the hardware, software, and control functions become nearly invisible conduits that (1) allow broad cognitive (sensory and mental) awareness of environment, forces, material assets, and the enemy and (2) provide multi-dimensional, easily recognizable space vs. time relationships, and assist in operational end-state prediction. The collective vision (ARL and Federated Partners), within fiscal constraints, flowed into a set of research approaches which maximize the use of human sensory modalities and apply these heuristically with individual soldiers at one end of the spectrum through units (staffs), asset availability, and the commander at the other end. A task set associated with user-centered battle space visualization assures that commanders' intentions and their expectations of subordinates are structured by understanding behavioral legacies associated with training, experience, and adaptation to discontinuous material change, e.g., paper tape to CDs, CRTs to retinal scanning. Both NCOs and officers acquire their doctrinal, tactical, and operational expertise via a conservative and evolutionary organizational structure. This structure is anchored in historic precedent, ever changing political environment, and experiential principles-rules based on wars and other operations conducted over many decades. Technology, until recently, entered the chronological stream as distinct tools that automated or assisted manual operations. Today, informational systems and complex weapon systems are personified by rapid discontinuous change, and these collide intellectually with soldiers who are a product of acquired skills, rule-based schema, and bureaucratic structure. Turbulent technologies imply that new soldier skills must develop rapidly (or the next change will overtake them), and old concepts of use must change or give way to take advantage of the possibilities these new technologies offer.
Where is all this going? All commanders, whether exceptional, good, adequate, or poor create a personal mental "gestalt" of their battle space. Modeling this complex and highly variable mental process has not been all that successful; not through lack of trying, but more so by the lack of fresh theories and functional methodologies. The heuristic flow of data-to-information-to-action may never be modeled to the extent that it can automatically (or "by itself") select commanders and predict real world battle outcomes. Without doubt, commercially available software does not reflect, even remotely the mental dynamics involved in personal scripting of the battle space and its complex dynamic events.
A second set of complex, most-of-the-time ambiguous, dynamic battles takes place among the commander, his immediate staff, and operational subordinates: "my direction", "my intent for you", "intentions of my superiors", and adversarial states is not without confusion. To date, relaying intent and collaboration between parties involved in a conflict has not been solved using commercial software primarily because of the dynamic environment, information ambiguities, and serendipitous events that occur during engagements. Complicating the problem are the changes that occur with each new experience and the impact of technology appliqus. Thus, the best way to make electronic information available to novice soldiers, mid-career professionals, and senior commanders (irrespective of echelon or mission) is to humanize the information management interface. As the Army gets smaller, it has to get smarter. The expectation that small, light units will replace the classical picture of Divisions puts heavy reliance on knowing, managing, and directing assets and allowing subordinate units flexibility (for operational execution) in carrying out the commander's intent. This is exactly what modern technology can accomplish. We must smooth the information management process, functionalize or tailor the display paradigm, and assure combinations are flexible and match the individual commander's practice. Without these basic features, we cannot assure acceptability by the military of the emerging technologies of today and those of tomorrow.
The initial research efforts of the Displays initiative of the Federated Laboratory Program span a variety of technologies and disciplines and are structured to provide a science base for heuristic solutions in Battle Space Visualization and Command and Control. These programs are dynamic, flexible, and ready to change as data and information accrue from ARL internal programs, Consortium efforts, or efforts outside the Federated Laboratory, i.e., RDECs, DARPA, and other services or other research sources. Fresh information and concepts are continually emerging, for example, the National Research Council Report on Tactical Displays for Soldiers or the University of Washington's retinal scanning technology; the first providing collective guidance for research initiatives, the second revolutionary way to display for the eyes.
A brief view of what is emerging from Consortium work includes:
We have, to the extent possible, in our first 10 months of operation:
As we move to an Army After Next Force structure, we cannot afford to trade out old, ineffective systems with new, equally ineffective systems that supplant manual tasks with automated functions incapable of being manipulated by users contending with the stress of engagements. Instead, we must develop technologies that, as new skills, are required for the new technologies, allow us to stay sharp on the old acquired skills of a less technological age, in case the plug gets pulled.