An Experimental Study of Field Dependency in Altered Extreme Environments

Failure to address extreme environments constraints at the human-computer interaction level may lead to the commission of critical and potentially fatal errors. This experimental study addresses gaps in our current theoretical understanding of the impact of±Gz accelerations and field dependency independency on task performance in human-computer interaction. It investigates the effects of ±Gz accelerations and field dependency independency on human performance in the completion of perceptual motor tasks on a personal digital assistant (PDA). We report the results of an experimental study, conducted in an aerobatic aircraft under multiple ±Gz conditions, showing that cognitive style significantly impacts latency and accuracy in target acquisition for perceptual motor tasks in altered ±Gz environments and propose design guidelines as countermeasures. Based on the results, we argue that developing design requirements taking into account cognitive differences in extreme environments will allow users to execute perceptual motor tasks efficiently without unnecessarily increasing cognitive load and the probability of critical errors. ACM Classification