Behind Human Error, 2nd Edition

7MINDSET

ATTENTIONAL DYNAMICS

Mindset is about attention and its control (Woods, 1995b). It is especially critical when examining human performance in dynamic, evolving situations where practitioners are required to shift attention in order to manage work over time. In all real world settings there are multiple signals and tasks competing for practitioner attention. On flight decks, in operating rooms, or shipboard weapon control centers, attention must flow from object to object and topic to topic. Sometimes intrusions into practitioner attention are distractions but other times they are critical cues that important new data is available (Klein, Pliske, et al., 2005). There are a host of issues that arise under this heading. Situation awareness, ...