Effect of Wearing Night Vision Goggles on Voice Level During a Visual Target Acquisition Task

摘要

There have been numerous undocumented reports that military users of night vision goggles (NVGs) tend to talk louder than usual when they wear the viewing device. Increased voice level in response to using the night vision aid could seriously compromise the security of military missions that depend upon stealth for their success. The goal of this study was to investigate the effects of characteristics of the NVGs such as display resolution, field of view, and physical constraint on the voice level of NVG users as the users described military activity of potential targets seen during a visual target acquisition task. The experiment was conducted indoors without the presence of situational variables or psychological stressors ordinarily found in the field. The authors wished to determine whether voice level depended on the physical characteristics of the NVGs. No effect of physical characteristics of the NVGs was observed. The influence of situational variables on the vocal output of NVG users will be examined in a future experiment. Some aspects concerning the procedures used to measure voice levels and to develop a realistic visual target acquisition task are discussed.