The Advanced Cognitive Engineering (ACE) Lab at Carleton University specializes in research regarding transport safety. The ACE Lab uses virtual and full-scale flight simulation to investigate foundational principles of cognition and human-machine integration. Given the current physical distancing restrictions, the ACE Lab is seeking volunteers to participate in an upcoming “virtual” study that will be of interest to the aviation community.
This online study represents the next phase of our validation of the CANFLY, a cognitive health screening tool for pilots. The main goal of the CANFLY research agenda is to promote flying for as long as safely possible. The CANFLY has shown excellent promise as a tool for identifying cognitive factors associated with risk during flight. For the CANFLY study, participants will answer short questions about situation awareness after watching four short interactive video clips of flight scenarios. Validation on a large scale with pilots across Canada is an important aspect of this phase of the CANFLY research. Here is a link to our online CANFLY study! The study URL is https://acelab.limequery.com/952586?lang=en
Later this year we hope to launch a second online study entitled: “Visual Illusions in Virtual Reality Flight Simulation”. The Illusions study will explore the presence and impact of flight-related visual illusions in 3D virtual reality (VR) environments. This study is innovative, as it is seeking licensed pilots who use their own 3D VR systems like the HTC Vive or Oculus Rift. During the study, participants will complete several guided flight scenarios. Your interaction with the researcher will be through virtual meeting means! The results of this study will provide us with insight into the validity of training and testing pilots for flight illusions using VR systems (which are economical and offer high ecological validity).
For both studies, pilots of all ages and levels of experience are encouraged to participate. Rather than having to attend our physical laboratory, we are modifying our research methods so that data can be collected from pilots in the comfort of their own homes. As always, the data will be completely anonymized, as we do not ask for person identifiers and IP addresses are not trackable through our platform.
For further inquiries or to indicate interest in participating in one or both of the upcoming studies you can contact the researchers at CessnaStudy@gmail.com
We thank you for your interest and hope to hear from you soon!