Many human-computer interfaces are limited to non-intuitive visual displays, overloading the user with complex information presented in a format that takes both time and effort to understand. Most displays are remnants from mechanical systems, whether needles attached to air bellows to indicate plane altitude or a white rectangle indicating a sheet of paper in a word processing program. The user only gets information from the area where they are focusing their eyes and, frequently, must interpret a number or dial position and translate that into actionable knowledge, such as whether a vehicle is traveling too fast.
New visual displays being developed at IHMC exploit current vision and neuroscience research to reinvent the presentation of information by exploiting the sophisticated processing power of the human visual system. These displays present data in a manner that allows the operator to understand effortlessly. They also tap the full peripheral to foviated spectrum of the user's vision to provide information, allowing the user to receive most necessary information without focusing on each piece individually. Such displays allow the user to absorb and understand more information with less cognitive effort.
Reducing the cognitive effort required to maintain operator situational awareness is critical in many real-time domains. For example fast moving aircraft, such as airliners and military aircraft, require a large cognitive effort by the pilot especially during uncommon or emergency circumstances. IHMC is working with leading defense contractors to transition OZ technology into the military cockpit, enabling superior flying performance with greater capacity for handling secondary tasks.
Our proprioceptive sense, both balance from the inner ear vestibular system as well as touch, pressure, and limb position, is our primary means of orienting ourselves but does not provide useful information in many situations. In flight, for example, proprioception only gives orientation related to the plane. The pilot must rely, instead, on visual information from flight instruments and the view out the window to determine the orientation of the plane, while actively suppressing reactions to changing proprioceptive cues.
This conflict between vision and proprioception heightens in tasks, such as hovering in helicopters, where neither visual nor proprioceptive cues provide sufficient information. This ambiguity makes such tasks extremely challenging to learn and master. IHMC is developing interfaces that defuse this conflict by constructing individual indicators for the six degrees of freedom found in vertical take-off and landing flight. By integrating these indicators into a consistent, coherent whole, IHMC researchers are finding ways to not only make complex tasks easier to understand, but also easier to learn.