The Evaluation of a Playbook Interface for Human-Autonomy Teaming in Single Pilot Operations

Abstract

This paper presents preliminary results of an evaluation of a Playbook delegation interface for human-autonomy teaming (HAT) in Single Pilot Operations (SPO). In this context, autonomy is defined as a class of automation that acts with more intention and authority, and it behaves more like a team member than a tool. In SPO, there will be a single pilot who will serve as the pilot-in-command (PIC) to make all flight decisions, perform flight tasks, and collaborate with an autonomous teammate during the flight. To enable a move to SPO, an autonomous teammate would share responsibility, authority, and tasks with a human operator to achieve the mission goals. HAT is the study of how to design the functions, interaction, and skills of autonomous teammate to work best with humans as a team. A Playbook interface has been developed as a delegation interface for HAT to support the single pilot during the flights. It allows humans to express their intent to an autonomous teammate to efficiently adapt the function allocation in response to a situation. This may lead to more efficient coordination and joint team performance. The ability to delegate implies that function allocation between teammates can be dynamic and responsive to the current situation. Specifically, in HAT, the challenge in deciding the function allocation prior to and during task execution is how to enable teammates to express their intent to each other quickly and accurately. In SPO, Playbook enables the single pilot to call a template play and modify it with the collaboration of the autonomous teammate. The modification of a play allows not only the changing of task details but also allows changes in allocation between the human and the autonomous teammates. The Playbook evaluation study aims to evaluate (1) the ability of pilots to make function allocation decisions in real-time, and (2) the usability and functionality of the Playbook interface.