Marcus Arenius - marar906 - Getting the Feeling - “Human Error” in an educational ship-handling simulator.docx

In high-risk environments of seafaring, simulators constitute a widely used tool in preparing nautical students for the challenges to be met in real-life working situations. While the technical development of ship bridge simulators continues at a breathtaking pace, little is known on how developments fulfil their intended safety critical purpose during actual simulator training exercises. In order to investigate this, a mixed-methods quasi-experimental field study (N =6) was conducted aiming at discerning the systemic causes behind committed human errors and to what extent these causes can be related to the technical layout of the simulator in general and a decision supporting display in particular. The nautical students’ performance in terms of committed errors was analysed when the decision supporting display was either inactive or active during two different exercise batches. Drawing upon eye tracking evaluation, interviews and simulator video recordings, systemic causes leading to human errors were identified. Results indicate that all errors occur under the same kind of (stressful) interaction. Based on this design requirements aiming at promoting resilient crew behaviour were proposed. Table of Content