Abstract
The purpose of this study was to assess the accuracy of pace counting under varying conditions and to resolve discrepancies between U.S. Army Field Manual 21-26 (FM 21-26; Department of the Army, 1987) and pace-counting research conducted by Powers (1964). Two experiments were designed to measure accuracy of distance estimations from pace counting on-road and off-road under conditions of daylight and darkness. In both experiments, male soldiers enrolled in One Station Unit Training (OSUT) were trained to estimate distances based on pace counts performed on a flat road during daylight. In Experiment 1, the soldiers were tested on a flat road during both daylight and darkness; in Experiment 2, soldiers were tested off-road on hilly terrain during both daylight and darkness. The general finding in both experiments was that soldiers tended to underestimate distance during day- light and to overestimate distance during darkness. These errors became greater as the test conditions became less like the training condition. It was concluded that pace count should be adjusted, as indicated by FM 21-26, either by opportunities for more training time or by standard pace-count adjustment formulas. Also, because of inherent inaccuracies, pace count should be used as a backup and/or in conjunction with other land navigation techniques.
Published Version
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