Real-time Cooperative Behavior for Tactical Mobile Robot Teams: Skills Impact Study for Tactical Mobile Robot Operational Units

摘要

This report provides a detailed study of the design of feasible human-robot interfaces for near-term deployment in a robot unit, defined as a tightly coupled group of humans using a multiplicity of robots as tactical tools. There is a strong relationship between three phases of fielding man- machine systems of this type: system design, operator selection, and operator training. Here we consider all of these dimensions, developing an understanding of the tradeoffs between highly-trained operators versus novice operators, the importance of specific cognitive and intellectual reasoning abilities of potential operators, and the impact of system design on all of this. Clearly, a sophisticated, well-designed system will require less training and enable a larger set of people to interact with it. The purpose of this study is to span this space of potential design and human factors issues and identify the inherent wins, losses, and trade-offs given the goal of rapidly fielding such a system.