Recognition Training for Ship Status Using Microcomputer Based CAI

Abstract

Microcomputer-based Computer Aided Instruction (CAI) has proven useful in many object recognition tasks, most recently for night attitude recognition of aircraft (Urban, Hottman, and Nelson, 1983; Hottman and Urban, 1983). The application in this study involved the presentation of navigation lights on ships at night from various approach directions. The ability to correctly identify the ship orientation and heading is ship status recognition. Ship outlines and navigation light configurations were used as two types of approaches to train ship status recognition.

The performance of any complex task such as this can be improved through two steps: optimization of the system, and training. The inherent flexibility of CAI programming languages and the nature of the task make microcomputer-based systems a very viable approach for training ship status recognition.

This study examined the application of a microcomputer-based version of the PILOT language to such a problem, with graphic representation of navigation and running lights as viewed from various directions. Two CAI training conditions were developed and evaluated. Condition one consisted of subjects being presented with the navigation lighting configuration first and then having to pick the appropriate ship orientation. Condition two consisted of subjects being presented with the ship orientation first and then having to pick the appropriate lighting configuration. Subjects were given a pretest and posttest to evaluate ship status recognition performance.

Preliminary results indicate that the use of microcomputer CAI represents a viable approach to familiarizing bridge personnel with running and navigation light configurations. Performance data include the number of correct responses and the reaction times associated with these responses. Between group and within group analyses were conducted to determine pretest/posttest effects and the effects of training presentation formats. Follow on studies are being planned with light orientations that are dynamic and where the background is noisy (background environmental lights).