Recent advances in computers and technology have made VR (Virtual Reality) devices with imbedded training applications focused on learning more commercially available. Additionally, there is potential to realize effective training with minimal human-instructor interaction. The authors were interested in whether a VR training-environment, coupled with software designed to effectively guide the student through a task, could improve the performance of a USAF pilot with minimal human-instructor guidance. The authors chose checklist execution as the measured task within static flight environments (e.g. the aircraft may be “airborne” but the focus is on checklist execution rather than aircraft movement/flight-path), and investigated whether training provided by the VR-device improved pilots’ performance. Twelve subjects (n=12) were randomly selected, six had no VR training (nVR) and six had VR training (yVR). The six nVR subjects had completed a 3-month training program consisting of lectures, computer-based training, testing, and 20 hours of guided practice sessions at a physical cockpit station (aka “cardboard trainer”). Whereas, the six yVR subjects were only subjected to 20 hours of training within the VR device – they had no other academics. At the completion of training, both the nVR and yVRgroups were asked to complete the Before Starting Engines Checklist in a new environment – a full-motion simulator representative of the actual aircraft. Measures of “time to completion” (time) and “number of errors” (numerr) were used as indicators of student performance. The results showed that there was no statistically significant difference in time between the nVR and yVR subjects (p=0.8713); however, the mistake made by the yVR subjects was significantly less than the nVR subjects (p=0.0402). The author’s conclude that a VR device, when coupled with software designed to focus the subject’s training to the task, is likely responsible for the reduction in errors when compared with the older, established training technique.
Keywords
AUGMENTED AND VIRTUAL REALITY (AR/VR),COMPETENCY BASED TRAINING,FLIGHT TRAINING,PART TASK TRAINER
Additional Keywords