Eye Movement Characteristics Research on Pilots of Different Experience Background During Aircraft Cockpit Display Image Visual Search Task

The purpose of the study was to find visual search characteristics on cockpit man-machine interface by the pilots with different flight experiences and different ages. Methods Test objects were 44 men; they were divided into three groups according to different aircraft cockpit experiences with large screen display or different age groups. The completely randomized block test was used. The instrument for recording eye movement was adopted in the process of eye-target search. Results Among 14 parameters for eye movement, 13 parameters were statistically significant (P < 0.05). Significant differences existed between groups of different experience background. There were seven indicators showed that the novice group was more than the expert group, the expert pilot group was greater than the mature group. The results of different age groups were as follows: Significant differences existed among three groups of different ages. Eight eye movement indicators showed that the values of 40-45-year-old group were more than that of 25-35-year-old group; the values of 25-35-year-old group were more than that of 35-40-year-old group. Conclusion The novice group was least familiar with screen layout and therefore search target took longer time and more fixation points. The expert pilot group is the most experienced in three groups, but they took more time to search targets than the mature group. The reason might be that "no error" thought forced them to confirm on the same issue repeatedly, resulting that the search efficiency was lower. Data of different age groups showed that the older the ages were the worse eye movement data were. This shows that as the increase of age the eye's capture and search ability fall. But for some other indicators, 35-40-year-old group was better than that of 25-35-year-old group, indicating that there were interactions between the experienced background and ages because there were more novice pilots in 25-35-year-old group, familiarity of the picture can make up for the lack of physical reaction speed.