Situation Awareness Misconceptions and Misunderstandings

Abstract

Situation awareness (SA) has become a widely used construct within the human factors community, the focus of considerable research over the past 25 years. This research has been used to drive the development of advanced information displays, the design of automated systems, information fusion algorithms, and new training approaches for improving SA in individuals and teams. In recent years, a number of papers criticized the Endsley model of SA on various grounds. I review those criticisms here and show them to be based on misunderstandings of the model. I also review several new models of SA, including situated SA, distributed SA, and sensemaking, in light of this discussion and show how they compare to existing models of SA in individuals and teams.

A situation awareness analysis scheme to identify deficiencies of complex man-machine interactions

“…Pointers from working memory to long-term memory can activate mental models or schema supporting comprehension and projection and filling in missing information. The working memory provides the current situation values of the activated mental model or schema (Endsley, 2015). An operator who can successfully use a mental model to fill information gaps can be sufficiently supported with an information system which provides partial information.…”

Informational Challenges in Early Disaster Response: The Massive Oso/SR530 Landslide 2014 as Case in Point

“…The mission-critical role of actionable and integrated information in disaster response has increasingly been emphasized in recent research ( [10,21,24]). Shared situational awareness leading to a shared common operating picture [9,10,17,24] are considered foundational to agile, disciplined, and effective emergency and disaster response [16].…”

“…Shared situational awareness leading to a shared common operating picture [9,10,17,24] are considered foundational to agile, disciplined, and effective emergency and disaster response [16]. However, the larger the disaster the more agencies respond, and the more complex is the coordination of action [7,18].…”

“…Information and communication technologies (ICTs) have assumed increasingly important roles in supporting and facilitating information behavior and information flows, in general. In disaster management, they have become key elements [4,18] in providing high-quality, mission-critical, and timely and actionable information, fulfilling the rapidly changing ad-hoc information needs of first responders [18,19,26]), although they can also be the cause for information overload, work overload, and other stressors [10]. Information behavior and information flows under disaster conditions depend on robust and resourceful information infrastructures, which are embedded in social structures and processes (including formal and informal organizational processes) as their key elements [6,22,26].…”

Providing Information on the Spot: Using Augmented Reality for Situational Awareness in the Security Domain

“…Endsley and Robertson (2000) further suggest team performance is linked to shared goals, the interdependence of team member actions and the division of labour between team members. Human factors research further identified the concepts of shared SA as "the degree to which team members have the same SA on shared SA requirements" (Endsley and Jones 2001) and distributed SA which is defined as "SA in teams in which members are separated by distance, time and/or obstacles" (Endsley 2015). Endsley (2015) further points out that despite being distributed "the SA needs of the team members are the same as when they are collocated, but are made much more difficult to achieve".…”