Collaboration technologies for tactical command & control: Performance, workload, and situation awareness

Future tactical command and control (C2) will undoubtedly be affected by a shift toward network-centric warfare (NCW), a concept of operations that relies on sophisticated information and communication technologies for enabling real-time collaboration and heightened shared situational awareness among geographically-distributed individuals and teams. One of the necessary components of NCW is the availability of appropriate and effective collaboration tools and an understanding of how they affect individual and team performance efficiency, problem solving, decision making, situation awareness, workload, and communication. This is especially true given that these teams will be faced with making high-stake decisions under non-optimal conditions characterized by time stress, incomplete and/or inaccurate information, rapidly changing situations, and uncertainty. To date, the majority of research on collaboration technologies has been limited to face-to-face collaboration versus computer-mediated collaboration, with much of it showing an advantage for face-to-face collaboration in terms of speed and quality of the teampsilas decisions. Moreover, it has been noted that theoretical models of collaborative decision making, frameworks and models of collaboration technologies and processes, and empirical data describing the impacts of collaboration technology on team processes are lacking. Accordingly, the Air Force Research Laboratorypsilas Collaborative Tools for Tactical Command and Control Research Program assembled a multi-university research consortium to examine the impact of collaboration technologies on selection, workload, and team decision making in tactical command and control teams in simulated network-centric environments. This proposed panel comprises consortium members and represents a range of world-renown experts in mental workload assessment, cognitive neuroscience, human-system interaction, computer supported collaboration, humans and automation, and team de- - cision making and team performance. The purpose of the panel will be to report and discuss the research that was conducted as part of the 18-month consortium project.