Monitoring radio messages while driving is an omnipresent dual-task combination in police work, but it is also one that is considered unsafe for regular drivers. Whereas regular drivers are expected to fully prioritize the driving task, police officers typically do not have the option to stop their car to attend important incoming messages, nor can they afford an uninformed arrival at the scene. A novel method for the visualization of observational data shows that police work is highly fragmented, and suggests that frequent reports on work overload are related to dual- task involvement in this fragmented workflow. Therefore, a series of experimental studies have been conducted to understand the mechanics that underlie and result from task prioritization in a dynamic complex socio-technical system, such as the police context. Methodological implications are presented for the interpretation of tradeoffs between task performance and mental effort as function of task prioritization. Furthermore, practical implications are presented for the development of information technology in police vehicles. Finally, recommendations for future research include the validation of an integrated model on coping strategies, task prioritization, and dual-task switching.@en

In the old days, spacecraft alarming notifications to operators were directed, upon arrival to ground, to one of those needle printers. Trained operators could tell, from the length and rhythm of the printer noise, what kind of alarm it was and therefore infer the criticality or the subject. Today, in monitoring and control systems (MCS) currently in use at the European Space Agency (ESA), there is no care to convey information in the sounds, and these alarm sounds have not been systematically designed to indicate the type of system failure and further elicit the desired and accurate operator response. Operators depend heavily on the graphical interfaces in order to pinpoint the source of alarm sounds (see Fig. 1) which further creates cognitive load. Similarly, switching cost from auditory perception to visual perception while finding the source of the information is undesirable when time can be a precious commodity for operators when monitoring valuable spacecraft. Therefore, ESA teamed up with Delft University of Technology and Plymouth University in order to investigate and design a new auditory display for the control rooms located in the European Space Operations Centre (ESOC), in Darmstadt, Germany@en

Objective: We examine how transitions in task demand are manifested in mental workload and performance in a dual-task setting. Background: Hysteresis has been defined as the ongoing influence of demand levels prior to a demand transition. Authors of previous studies predominantly examined hysteretic effects in terms of performance. However, little is known about the temporal development of hysteresis in mental workload. Method: A simulated driving task was combined with an auditory memory task. Participants were instructed to prioritize driving or to prioritize both tasks equally. Three experimental conditions with low, high, and low task demands were constructed by manipulating the frequency of lane changing. Multiple measures of subjective mental workload were taken during experimental conditions. Results: Contrary to our prediction, no hysteretic effects were found after the high- to low-demand transition. However, a hysteretic effect in mental workload was found within the high-demand condition, which degraded toward the end of the high condition. Priority instructions were not reflected in performance. Conclusion: Online assessment of both performance and mental workload demonstrates the transient nature of hysteretic effects. An explanation for the observed hysteretic effect in mental workload is offered in terms of effort regulation. Application: An informed arrival at the scene is important in safety operations, but peaks in mental workload should be avoided to prevent buildup of fatigue. Therefore, communication technologies should incorporate the historical profile of task demand. @en

Satellite monitoring and control systems provide the possibility for audible alarms to signal system events that require operators to pay attention and eventually to take action. The audible alarms that are currently in use at ESA control areas are very basic and unfortunately non-discriminating with respect to the events they are signalling. These audible alarms consist of sound files often arbitrarily fished out from the Internet; thus, when they sound they convey no added information about the event that caused it. No considerations whatsoever are made concerning their suitability, ergonomic aspects, or effects of such alarms on operators working on long shifts. Because sounds are prompting a much faster reaction from operators than visual cues, when used efficiently they can also be made to establish criticality, urgency, origin or expected action (think for example on your car alarm that tells you to buckle up or that you are about to bump the car behind you). This paper describes the work performed together with Delft University of Technology and the University of Plymouth to analyse the satellite monitoring problem, to define a sound alarm philosophy that foresees different levels of urgency/criticality associated with typical operator actions based on contextual enquiry in the field, and the corresponding implementation of a library of coherent sounds that include 3 themes of 5 sounds each that map to the levels defined. It will also describe the evaluation of the sounds with operators and how the Cluster mission is implementing a solution to deploy this alarm philosophy and sounds in its dedicated control area, making sure to analyse evolution of operator behaviour before and after the deployment.@en

Our daily lives are filled with interruptions and transitions from one task to another, resulting in a fragmented workflow. These can be students who knock on our doors when we are writing a paper, or traffic updates that require us to reschedule our route to work. Consider nurses who sequentially divide their attention between patients (e.g., Potter et al., 2004). Or consider a team of police officers, who just transported a suspect to the police station after a demanding pursuit. They are about to process the corresponding paperwork at their office when they receive an urgent call, after which they start driving to the reported incident location. The historical profiles of task transitions have been associated with recuperation in task performance (Matthews and Desmond, 2002) and mental workload (Morgan and Hancock, 2011). Furthermore, there is a substantial body of research that investigates the impact of interruptions on our work and well-being (e.g., Monk et al., 2008; Bailey and Iqbal, 2008). However, as Baethge (2013) argues, these studies typically focus on isolated interruptions, thereby neglecting the accumulation of many interruptions throughout a day. As a result, she continues, an understanding of isolated interruptions cannot be generalized to a working day. In addition, Randall et al. (2000) argue that theoretical constructs based on findings in one domain may not be generalizable to another domain. These notions of limited ecological validity and generalizability have resulted in a move outside of the familiar laboratory environment, judged by the increasing amount of field studies in living labs (e.g., Keyson et al., 2013; Vastenburg et al., 2009; Niitamo et al., 2006). Changes in research methodology cause changes in the way we present and, consequentially, interpret our data. Data visualization facilitates exploration by transforming large amounts of textual or numeric data into graphical formats (Kondaveeti et al., 2012; Segelström, 2009; Card et al., 1999).... @en

The role of task prioritization in performance tradeoffs during multi-tasking has received widespread attention. However, little is known on whether people have preferences regarding tasks, and if so, whether these preferences conflict with priority instructions. Three experiments were conducted with a high-speed driving game and an auditory memory task. In Experiment 1, participants did not receive priority instructions. Participants performed different sequences of single-task and dual-task conditions. Task performance was evaluated according to participants’ retrospective accounts on preferences. These preferences were reformulated as priority instructions in Experiments 2 and 3. The results showed that people differ in their preferences regarding task prioritization in an experimental setting, which can be overruled by priority instructions, but only after increased dual-task exposure. Additional measures of mental effort showed that performance tradeoffs had an impact on mental effort. The interpretation of these findings was used to explore an extension of Threaded Cognition Theory with Hockey’s Compensatory Control Model.@en