A Comparison of a Stereographic 3-D Display versus a 2-D Display Using an Advanced Air-to-Air Format

Abstract

This study compared the relative abilities of a stereoscopic 3-D display versus a conventional 2-D display to provide spatial location information. The evaluation was conducted as a part mission, full-task simulation in the context of an air-to-air fighter mission. A dual task paradigm was employed requiring the subjects to acquire situation awareness of their immediate air-to-air environment while simultaneously performing a simple flight task. Situation awareness was defined as the ability to visually search a spatial quadrant of the air-to-air situation display relative to the ownship symbol and identify the number of aircraft symbols in a given target group found in that quadrant. The simulated flight task was a two-axis tracking task on a dynamic Head-Up Display format, using a force-stick controller. The subject's response speed and accuracy on the search task and deviations from the given track on the flight task were used as performance measures in this study. The results showed a significant accuracy performance advantage for those formats presented with the stereoscopic 3-D display.