Training and assessment with a faster than real-time simulation of a drinking water treatment plant

The usefulness of a human-in-the-loop drinking-water-treatment-plant simulator was investigated for training and assessment. An in-simulator transfer of training experiment was conducted with three groups training with accelerated simulation, experienced operators (EO), inexperienced operators (IO), and laymen (L60x) and a group of laymen training at real-time speed (L1x). Participants learned how to improve water quality during training. Upon transfer, when confronted with a different process disturbance than during training, L60x performed significantly poorer than EO and IO combined. No difference was found between EO and IO, and during transfer, L60x outperformed L1x. These results indicate that learning to control slow and complex processes may improve by training with a realistic simulation running at accelerated speed.