Displaying information to support transparency for autonomous platforms

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to summarize display design techniques that are best suited for displaying information to support transparency of communication in autonomous systems interfaces. The principles include Ecological Interface Design, integrated displays, and pre-attentive cuing. Examples of displays from two recent experiments investigating how transparency affects operator trust, situational awareness, and workload, are provided throughout the paper as an application of these techniques. Specifically, these interfaces were formatted using the Situation awareness-based Agent Transparency model as a method of formatting the information in displays for an autonomous robot—the Autonomous Squad Member (ASM). Overall, these methods were useful in creating usable interfaces for the ASM display.