An air traffic control display concept for conveying integrated temporal and probabilistic conflict information

An innovative air traffic control display that explicitly incorporates uncertainties in velocity, heading, and position of each airplane is introduced. Probabilistic, temporal, and spatial information about conflicts is provided through integrated graphical patterns. As a part of a proof of concept evaluation, three display conditions were developed: Probabilistic Display consisting of probabilistic and temporal conflict information; Deterministic Display consisting of only temporal information; and Conventional Display without any conflict information. Participants engaged in an air traffic conflict resolution task by issuing commands that were then categorised into "appropriate" and "inappropriate" decisions using a post-hoc analysis tool. Taken together, the numbers of appropriate and inappropriate commands were not affected by the displays; however, when analysed separately, an interesting pattern of decision criteria emerged. Results also showed that mental workload was lower for the Probabilistic and Deterministic compared to the Conventional Display. Finally, subjects strongly preferred the Probabilistic Display over the others.