The Relationship Between Effort Rating and Performance in a Critical Tracking Task

This report documents the results of a preliminary evaluation of a pilot Objective/ Subjective Workload Assessment Technique (POSWAT). The study employed a critical tracking task, in which 24 subjects (pilots and nonpilots) viewed an analog display of the error between operator input and system output while correcting with opposite pressure on a joystick. The purpose was to determine if there was a relationship between participant responses on a 10-point scale administered during task performance and tracking task difficulty. It is generally concluded that POSWAT used for measuring effort rating and rating delay on a regular basis during this experiment is minimally intrusive, is informative, and merits further evaluation in a cockpit environment