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Assessing the structure of non-routine decision processes in Airline Operations Control
Floor Richters1, Jan Maarten Schraagen2, Hans Heerkens1
1a School of Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences , University of Twente , Enschede , The Netherlands.
Ergonomics
|July 31, 2015
Summary
Airline Operations Control professionals facing unfamiliar disruptions often reframe problems into familiar ones. This rule-based strategy, rather than knowledge-based processing, leads to higher quality decision outcomes.
Area of Science:
- Cognitive Psychology
- Human Factors Engineering
- Aviation Management
Background:
- Airline Operations Control (AOC) professionals face significant challenges during unfamiliar disruptions.
- Expertise is often stretched to its limits, impacting decision-making quality.
Purpose of the Study:
- To elucidate the decision-making process structure of AOC professionals during unfamiliar disruptions.
- To investigate the relationship between this decision structure and the quality of outcomes.
Main Methods:
- A simulated task involving unfamiliar disruptions was designed.
- Think-aloud protocols were collected from AOC professionals to map macrocognitive activities.
- Decision quality was measured against the observed decision process structure.
Main Results:
- The decision process structure under unfamiliar disruptions mirrored routine conditions.
- Macrocognitive activities (sensemaking, option evaluation, action planning) and rule-based approaches were consistent.
- High-quality decision outcomes correlated with the use of rule-based strategies.
Conclusions:
- Successful AOC professionals effectively reframe unfamiliar problems into familiar ones.
- This reframing, utilizing rule-based strategies, is key to achieving high-quality decisions in challenging situations.
- Expert performance in novel disruptions relies on transforming the unknown into the known.
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