Future concepts for mission execution and platform capabilities on programs such as Future Vertical Lift (FVL) generate expectations for pilot skills to manage vast data sets while interacting with autonomous assets. As a result, there are several considerations for training pilots in preparation for advanced teaming tasking including communication, trust, and workload balance (Anania, Atkinson, Frick, Pharmer, & Killilea, 2020). From a workload perspective, training that provides pilots with an opportunity to learn to deal effectively with dense data volumes and to coordinate with autonomous systems and unmanned assets will be critical to successful operations.
As part of an on-going effort to develop training technologies and tools to assist with workload evaluation and mastery, a series of interviews were conducted with pilots from existing Department of Defense platforms. The goal of these interviews was to establish a baseline understanding of the types of automation currently available to pilots. These interactions provided an opportunity to identify challenges associated with employing automation in operations, and to utilize pilot insights to optimize training processes associated with the adoption of new technologies. This paper reviews themes generated from these interviews and provides insight into the types of emerging and innovative technologies that might facilitate the workload training needed to produce proficient future pilots (e.g., how pilot training, alongside Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems, can shape and improve AI systems themselves. Findings address existing automation (levels and challenges), future increases in automation (perceptions and barriers to adoption), factors impacting operator trust of automated systems and AI, and methods to improve training (technology and pipeline). Discussions focus on the design of a learning management system that integrates human performance modeling and simulation based-training to offer near-real time iterative training to improve: teaming, situation awareness, technology understanding, and pilot workload management.
Keywords
AI
Additional Keywords
Future Vertical Lift, Advanced Teaming, Multi-Domain Data Fusion, Learning Management System