Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

The Aviation Illusion-Situational Judgment Test: Development And Evaluation, John Kleber

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Situational judgment tests (SJTs) are scenario-based assessments that evaluate an individual's capacity to make key judgments relating to specific contexts. While SJTs are traditionally used for personal selection (e.g., managers, customer service personnel, and police officers), SJTs also demonstrate potential for use in training evaluation. One area of interest in aviation is aeronautical decision-making (ADM) during inflight encounters with aviation illusions. However, a gap in research exists regarding how to measure pilots’ capacity to make judgments about illusions during flight.

This dissertation aimed to develop and validate an SJT that evaluates aeronautical decision-making (ADM) during inflight encounters with aviation illusions. …

Towards Agile Academia: An Approach To Scientific Paper Writing Inspired By Software Engineering, Tyler Procko

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The construction of scientific papers is performed in service of the greater scientific community. This iterative process is, in effect, an academic economy, where all members benefit from well-written papers. However, many published scientific papers are poorly written; they often lack sufficient detail to allow replication, there is improper usage of citations or a lack of regard to relevant work, reporting is vague or without linked empirical data to allow verification, figures do not correspond to text or are non-sensical, literary elements, e.g., bulleted lists, are used ineffectively, formatting renders certain sections unreadable, and grammatical errors abound. The issues of …

Effectiveness And User Experience Of Augmented And Mixed Reality For Procedural Task Training, Emily Rickel

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Use of augmented reality (AR) and mixed reality (MR) technologies for training is increasing, due in part to opportunities for increased immersion, safer training, and reduced costs. However, AR/MR training effectiveness and user experience, particularly for head-mounted displays (HMDs), is not well understood. The purpose of this study is to investigate user perceptions and retention of AR/MR training delivered through a HMD for a procedural task. This two-part study utilized a within-subjects experimental design with 30 participants to determine how instruction method (paper vs. AR vs. MR) and time of procedure recall (immediate vs. post-test vs. retention) influenced completion time, …

Small Unmanned Aircraft Systems: Operator Workload And Situation Awareness Utilizing First Person View Techniques, Ross Lucas Stephenson Jr

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The small, unmanned aircraft systems (sUAS) sector within the aviation industry is experiencing unprecedented growth. However, the regulatory guidance for the safe integration of sUAS into the National Airspace System (NAS) has not kept pace with this technological growth within the market. Current regulatory limitations of line-of-sight operations may have an impact on the establishment of an equivalent level of safety for sUAS operations as maintained by manned aircraft. The focal point of the discussion of line-of-sight operations has been the ability of the sUAS pilot to see and avoid all obstacles and other aircraft in a safe and timely …

Public Acceptance Of Medical Screening Recommendations, Safety Risks, And Implied Liabilities Requirements For Space Flight Participation, Cory J. Trunkhill

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The space tourism industry is preparing to send space flight participants on orbital and suborbital flights. Space flight participants are not professional astronauts and are not subject to the rules and guidelines covering space flight crewmembers. This research addresses public acceptance of current Federal Aviation Administration guidance and regulations as designated for civil participation in human space flight.

The research utilized an ordinal linear regression analysis of survey data to explore the public acceptance of the current medical screening recommended guidance and the regulations for safety risk and implied liability for space flight participation. Independent variables constituted participant demographic representations …

Ems To Trauma Care Transitions: An Investigation Of Patient And Handoff Outcomes, Richard Simonson

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The helicopter as a method of emergency medical service transportation of trauma patients has a long history of effective use-cases dating back to its inception during the Vietnam war. Compared to ground-based emergency medical transit, helicopters have been able to reach severely injured patients in environments with challenging terrain features that ground-based medical services cannot traverse. Additionally, the helicopter offers quicker and more direct-route transit options that result in both quicker response and shorter transportation times compared to their ground-based alternative. Further, research has indicated that helicopter ambulance teams utilize paramedics with more experience than ground ambulance paramedics. Prior research …

Comparing Training Effects Of Virtual Reality Flight Simulation To Conventional Pc-Based Flight Simulation, Tianxin Zhang

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The purpose of the current project was to investigate the effect of utilizing Virtual Reality (VR) technologies for flight training by comparing the training results when using conventional desktop flight simulation versus VR flight simulation. Additionally, this project examined the user experience of VR flight simulation and how users’ motivation and satisfaction with VR simulations. This research employed a quasi-transfer of training experiment including 48 participants. Analyses indicated that VR group participants performed better in the post-training maneuver performance on an FTD than in the conventional desktop simulation group. Findings also supported that VR flight simulation could provide a better …

Effects Of Gamification On Knowledge Acquisition: Aviation Weather Online Training, Jacqueline Mcsorley

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Due to the high popularity of gaming, researchers have begun to implement aspects of these games into real life (known as gamification). Motivation and engagement may be influenced by certain game mechanics and user types, which then could also impact learning. A gap still exists as to whether leaderboards and narratives impact motivation or engagement when implemented in a non-game context (i.e., an online training program). Studies indicate that aviation weather training for general aviation pilots is underdeveloped, particularly for NEXRAD. In considering the competitive/ goal-oriented nature of pilots, gamification elements such as Achievements and Stories could best motivate pilots-in-training …

The Cost Of Playing The Game: Modeling In-Game Purchase Intention And Investigating Purchase Behavior Of Mobile Gamers, William J. Shelstad

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Free-to-play games typically have a monetization model that relies on players to purchase in-game items or virtual goods to generate revenue (Nguyen, 2015). There have been several empirical efforts to investigate purchase intention of virtual goods in video games with some focusing on quantitative models of purchase intention. Most of these studies tend to be with virtual worlds and lack the use of validated instruments to measure constructs (Hamari & Keronen, 2017). This research sought to gain a greater understanding of purchase intention of in-game content or virtual goods in mobile games through two studies.

Study 1 modeled purchase intention …

The Impact Of Individual And Team-Level Variables On Burnout In Healthcare Providers, Logan M. Gisick

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Burnout among medical providers is a growing issue with effects that start at the provider level and span outward to affect the entire hospital system. The consensus of the literature is that there are multiple categories of factors which lead to the development of burnout including personal characteristics, social characteristics, and job/work characteristics. Because of the highly collaborative and interpersonal nature of healthcare work, the interactions among team members have the potential to significantly influence provider burnout and recent studies are beginning to examine this interaction more carefully. However, there is little research that examines the relationship between multiple personal …

Intention To Complain About Unmanned Aircraft System Noise: A Structural Equation Analysis, Robert Brents

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Aircraft noise has a long and documented history as a source of public annoyance and a driver of noise complaints. The impending large-scale use of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS)s could expose a broader cross-section of the public to a new type of aircraft noise. Recent research notes some reactions to UAS noise, but no rigorous analyses of public intention to complain about UAS noise have been found.

Due to the potential proliferation of UASs and their attendant noise, understanding public reaction could advise both government and industry. Governments at all levels could apply the results to inform policies related to …

It's Not Just A Game: Exploring The Effects Of An Escape Room Team Building Intervention, Andrew C. Griggs M.S.

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Escape rooms have been used as a training intervention in multiple contexts, but their efficacy as a team building intervention is not well understood. The purpose of this study was to assess the effects of a team building escape room on perceptions of team processes and perceived team effectiveness, the sustainability of these effects, as well as relationships between team processes and task completion in this context. This research utilized archival data of 33 healthcare teams (n = 145 participants) completing a team building escape room and prospectively collected follow-up data from the same participants (n = 49 …

Pilot Perception Of Cockpit Organizational Framework’S Impact On Flight Safety And Subordinate Pilot Behavior, Robert D. Allen

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Past accidents have indicated that first officers (FO) are less likely to identify and correct captain errors than captains are to correct FO errors. Crew resource management (CRM) training was introduced in the late 1970s to improve captain teamwork skills to utilize the FO more effectively and to increase FO willingness to interject to preserve safety. Despite the effectiveness of CRM training programs, there continue to be incidences where subordinate pilots make weak or ineffective attempts to preserve safety.

This research investigated commercial and airline transport pilots’ perception of the impact cockpit organizational framework (COF) has on both flight safety …

The Effects Of At-Home Remote Work Environments On Human Cognitive Performance And Work Task Performance Based On Current Societal Conditions, Angela Arias

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Home-based remote work systems present a unique set of cognitive performance and work task performance challenges to employees without remote work experience. The COVID-19 pandemic forced companies into transforming their work system structures, and their employee roles, without the preparation or education of the dynamics that surround home-based remote work systems. This thesis benefits the Human Factors community by investigating the effects of at-home remote-based work environments on cognitive performance, and work task performance, of employees who currently work remotely from home. A multimethod approach was employed to carry out this research. A survey was administered to home-based remote employees, …

Developing A Predictive Model Of Depression And Suicidal Tendencies In Pilots, Tanya Kim Bulleigh

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The mental health of commercial airline pilots is as important as their physical health because of their immense responsibility for the safety of their passengers and crews. Pilot suicides that end in fatal aircraft crashes result in many injuries and deaths. Although depression and suicidal tendencies are common across all genders, ages, ethnicities, and backgrounds, the mental health of aviation pilots has been challenging to evaluate and quantify through routine flight medical exams.

The purpose of this study was to determine predictive factors of depression and suicidal tendencies among commercial airline pilots. Previous research has determined predictive factors of depression …

The Effects Of Carry-On Baggage On Aircraft Evacuation Efficiency, Sang-A Lee

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The most frequent obstacle of an aircraft evacuation is the passengers carrying baggage while evacuating. Passengers who insist on taking their carry-on baggage during an emergency evacuation not only slow down the evacuation process but also act as a significant risk to the safety of other passengers. This study investigated the factors that affect passengers’ behavioral intention to evacuate with carry-on baggage and the effects of evacuating with carry-on baggage on the total evacuation time. Overall, two studies were conducted to provide an outline of the factors that affect and affected by carry-on baggage.

Study 1 used an agent-based model, …

Assessment Of Evacuation Network Performance Under Different Evacuation Scenarios: The Florida Keys, Erika Shellenberger

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The goal of this research is to better understand the evacuation of a coastal community, the Florida Keys. This will aid in the planning, mitigation, response, and recovery of this community when a hurricane threatens to destroy their homes. To achieve this, a model of the Florida Keys was built in VISSIM, a microscopic traffic flow simulation software, to experiment with different improvement strategies. This process included collecting data about the Florida Keys, building the roadway network of the Florida Keys, calibrating and validating the model, modeling recommendations, and analyzing the outputs when imploring the different improvement strategies. In addition …

An Investigation Of Factors That Influence Passengers’ Intentions To Use Biometric Technologies At Airports, Kabir Olaseni Kasim

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Biometric technologies use the characteristics and measurements from humans to establish or verify their identity. Within an airport setting, biometric technologies can be used to hasten passenger processes such as airport check-in, baggage drop-off or pick-up, and aircraft boarding, thus enhancing the overall passenger experience.

This research investigated the factors that influence passengers’ intentions to choose the use of biometrics over other methods of identification. The current study utilized a quantitative research method via an online survey of 689 persons from Amazon ® Mechanical Turk ® (MTurk) and employed structural equation modeling (SEM) techniques for data analysis. The study utilized …

How Does Robotic Surgery Influence Communication, Leadership, And Team Outcomes? A Multimethod Examination., Jordan E. Rogers

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The practice of delivering surgical care has evolved to be less invasive to the patients undergoing surgery. Minimally-invasive surgery can be practiced through traditional laparoscopic methods as well as with robotic technology that displaces the surgeon from the operating table. Robotic surgery has been cited to be safer and more effective than traditional laparoscopic surgery; however, little research has endeavored to investigate the role of surgical modality upon aspects of teamwork. This dissertation contributes to the human factors and teamwork literature by evaluating how surgical modality may influence communication, shared leadership, and team outcomes. Multiple methods were employed to study …

Know Your User: Building A Predictive Model Of Consumer Preference For Driverless Cars, Mattie Nicole Milner

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

INTRODUCTION: This dissertation identifies factors significantly predicting participants' preference for riding in an autonomous vehicle rather than flying on a commercial aircraft. A plethora of research has investigated these two transportation industries independently; however, scarcely any research has considered the impact these two industries will have on each other. Travelers’ preference for riding in an autonomous vehicle rather than a commercial aircraft was investigated through four different scenarios.

METHOD: A regression equation was created to predict participants’ preferred travel method and validated through a two-stage process. Stage 1 involved the creation of the regression equation, and a total of 1,008 …

Pilot Acceptance Of Personal, Wearable Fatigue Monitoring Technology: An Application Of The Extended Technology Acceptance Model, Rachelle Lynne Strong

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The research problem of pilot fatigue has been referenced as a causal factor for aircraft accidents in many United States National Transportation and Safety Board (NTSB) accident reports; however, the United States Code of Federal Regulations 14 CFR Part 117, Flight and Duty Limitations and Rest Requirements for Flight Crew Members, does not provide a tangible means of measuring fatigue for aircraft crew members. This problem is relevant to the airline industry and the travelling public because pilot fatigue is preventable as a causal factor in aviation accidents, and pilots need an accurate way to measure it. Adoption of a …

Fixation Patterns Of Driving Scenes As A Function Of Task Load And Task Goal, Anastasia N. Diamond

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Distracted driving has been a heavily researched area, and the negative impacts it has on driving performance is well known. Eye movement patterns of distracted drivers have also been studied, though insight into what the driver specifically looks at is not as well known. Researchers have studied eye movement metrics like average fixation durations, eyes-off-road glance times, time to first fixation, among other eye movement variables, over an entire drive, but not as much attention has been given to what the driver is looking at in a specific moment in time. The current study uses the Tobii Pro X2-60 eye …

Blocks' Network: Redesign Architecture Based On Blockchain Technology, Moataz Hanif

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The Internet is a global network that uses communication protocols. It is considered the most important system reached by humanity, which no one can abandon. However, this technology has become a weapon that threatens the privacy of users, especially in the client-server model, where data is stored and managed privately. Additionally, users have no power over their data that store in a private server, which means users’ data may interrupt by government or might be sold via service provider for-profit purposes. Furthermore, blockchain is a technology that we can rely on to solve issues related to client-server model if appropriately …

Identifying Criteria To Predict Army Rifle Marksmanship Proficiency, Katlin Makina Anglin

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The United States Army requires each Soldier to develop marksmanship proficiency in an effort to achieve combat readiness. Soldiers currently develop marksmanship proficiency through Basic Rifle Marksmanship (BRM) training, but significant skill deficiencies are apparent at the end of training. These skill deficiencies remain throughout training because instructors rarely assess Soldiers objectively before the final qualification, reducing the opportunity for instructors to diagnose skill deficiencies until it is too late. Therefore, the goal of the current research is to identify individual differences and sensor-based performance measures for inclusion in a formative assessment during BRM training. The results of the current …

Communication And Trust In Virtual And Face-To-Face Teams, Anthony Lee Baker

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Virtual teams (VTs) accomplish shared goals by relying on technology-mediated communication to counteract geographic disparities. Rapid advances in technology have led to the near-ubiquity of VTs within modern organizations, but gaps in existing research designs afflict extant empirical VT research. This experiment evaluates the constructs of trust, communication, and effectiveness in VTs. Two-hundred six participants (103 teams) completed an interdependent task either face-to-face, mediated by a videoconferencing telepresence robot, or mediated by a voice call. I collected measures of cognitive trust, trust propensity, communication quality, and team effectiveness, and conducted in-depth communication analyses. Results suggest that while virtual teamwork does …

A Multi-Dimensional Model Of Enjoyment: Development And Validation Of An Enjoyment Scale (Enjoy), Shayn Davidson

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Enjoyment of an activity is central to positive experiences and can determine future behavior toward the activity or object of interest. In the literature there has been no consensus on the definition and dimensionality of enjoyment. In this dissertation, to provide clarity to the construct, a new multi-dimensional model and definition of enjoyment is proposed. To investigate enjoyment, a new measure of enjoyment applicable to any activity was developed using current best practices of scale development and validation.

The new instrument measures enjoyment of any activity, called the ENJOY scale. The ENJOY scale has 5 subscales and demonstrated good content …

Gender Difference In Situation Awareness When Receiving Wayfinding Direction By Landmarks And Headings, Ziyi Dong

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

In aviation, situation awareness (SA) is a fundamental requirement for effective flying and air traffic control. This skill has greatly been associated with pilot and air traffic controller performance. Previous studies in aviation and other fields have shown that gender differences exist in SA performance. Four hypotheses were tested in this study: women navigate better from landmark cues; men navigate better from headings cues; women have better SA performance than men when receiving landmark directions; and men have better SA when receiving cardinal directions. Thirty-eight participants drove a driving simulator twice. While driving, participants were asked SA questions to assess …

Human Factors Contributing To Unstabilized Approaches And Landings In Commercial Aviation Incidents: An Analysis Of Asrs Reports, Garrin E. Ross

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

The purpose of this study was to investigate the human factors reported as contributing to operational incidents of unstabilized approaches and landings in United States-based commercial aviation. While previous aviation safety studies have analyzed aviation incident data when investigating the human factor influences during commercial aviation operations and incidents, unstabilized approaches and landings have not been explicitly examined using similar methods. Informed by the findings and recommendations of the Flight Safety Foundation’s Approach and Landing Accident Reduction Task Force, this study examined and analyzed the Aviation Safety Reporting System (ASRS) incident report data from unstabilized approach and landing events. The …

Modeling The Use Of An Airborne Platform For Cellular Communications Following Disruptions, Stephen John Curran

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

In the wake of a disaster, infrastructure can be severely damaged, hampering telecommunications. An Airborne Communications Network (ACN) allows for rapid and accurate information exchange that is essential for the disaster response period. Access to information for survivors is the start of returning to self-sufficiency, regaining dignity, and maintaining hope. Real-world testing has proven that such a system can be built, leading to possible future expansion of features and functionality of an emergency communications system.

Currently, there are no airborne civilian communications systems designed to meet the demands of the public following a natural disaster. A system allowing even a …

The Proteus Effect And Gaming: The Impact Of Digital Actors And Race In A Virtual Environment, Christopher M. Via

Doctoral Dissertations and Master's Theses

Race and racial identity is a frequently discussed topic in the media today. This topic is driven by what oftentimes amounts to culture clashes, and a system that claims impartiality yet is rampant with implicit bias demonstrating favorable treatment of one race over another. An example of this favoritism resides within video game design, where over 50% of player-controlled game characters are White, and less than 40% are Black (Leonard, 2007). Leonard also wrote that Black game characters are more likely to conform to Black stereotypes (e.g. play sports, or involved in gangs) than Whites (e.g. middle class citizen or …