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Article
Publication date: 27 November 2017

Kushal Anjaria and Arun Mishra

Situation awareness theory is a primary mean to take decisions and actions in a dynamically changing environment. Nowadays, to implement situation awareness, theories and models…

Abstract

Purpose

Situation awareness theory is a primary mean to take decisions and actions in a dynamically changing environment. Nowadays, to implement situation awareness, theories and models in organizational scenarios have become an important research challenge. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between the situation awareness theory and cybernetics. Further, the aim is to use this relationship to check the feasibility of situation awareness-based information security risk management (ISRM) implementation in the organizational scenario.

Design/methodology/approach

To investigate the relationship between situation awareness theory and cybernetics, Endsley’s situation awareness theory and Norbert Wiener’s cybernetics concepts and philosophy have been used in the present work. For a detailed study, concepts, techniques and philosophy of the cybernetics have been extracted from the thesis of Norbert Wiener titled “The human use of human beings” and “Cybernetics or control and communication in the animal and the machine”.

Findings

The present paper demonstrates that relationship can be successfully established between cybernetics and situation awareness theory. Further, this relationship can be used to solve organizational implementation issues related to situation awareness based systems. To demonstrate relationship and solutions of implementation issues, two case studies related to ISRM are also incorporated in the present case study.

Originality/value

The present work bridges two parallel and prominent theories of situation awareness and cybernetics. It also demonstrates that combination of both the theories can be used to feasibly implement situation awareness based systems in organizations.

Details

Kybernetes, vol. 47 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0368-492X

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 1 June 2012

Yin Lili, Zhang Rubo and Gu Hengwen

The purpose of this paper is to provide a more capable and holistic adjustable autonomy system, involving situation reasoning among all involved information sources, to make an…

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide a more capable and holistic adjustable autonomy system, involving situation reasoning among all involved information sources, to make an adjustable autonomy system which knows what the situation is currently, what needs to be done in the present situation, and how risky the task is in the present situation. This will enhance efficiency for calculating the level of autonomy.

Design/methodology/approach

Situation reasoning methodologies are present in many autonomous systems which are called situation awareness. Situation awareness in autonomous systems is divided into three levels, situation perception, situation comprehension and situation projection. Situation awareness in these systems aims to make the tactical plans cognitive, but situation reasoning in adjustable autonomous systems aim to communicate mission assessments to unmanned vehicle or humans. Thus, in solving this problem, it is important to design a new situation reasoning module for the adjustable autonomous system.

Findings

The contribution of this paper is presenting the Situation Reasoning Module (SRM) for an adjustable autonomous system, which encapsulates event detection, cognitive situations, cognitive tasks, performance capacity assessment and integrated situation reason. The paper concludes by demonstrating the benefits of the SRM in a real‐world scenario, a situation reasoning simulation in unmanned surface vehicles (USV) while performing a navigation mission.

Originality/value

The method presented in this paper represents a new SRM to reason the situation for adjustable autonomous system. While the results presented in the paper are based on fuzzy logic and Bayesian network methodology. The results of this paper can be applicable to land, sea and air robotics in an adjustable autonomous system.

Details

International Journal of Intelligent Computing and Cybernetics, vol. 5 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1756-378X

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 7 November 2008

Jeongwook Son, Zeeshan Aziz and Feniosky Peña‐Mora

This paper aims to discuss how a high level of situation awareness (SA) has the potential to enhance first responders' performance and manage work demand resulting from…

1805

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to discuss how a high level of situation awareness (SA) has the potential to enhance first responders' performance and manage work demand resulting from distributed, dynamic, and chaotic situations resulting from a disaster in modern urban environments. It also aims to present a theoretical framework to address needs of an effective disaster response, enhanced collaboration and improved SA. The purpose of this is to help better understand current disaster response schemes in terms of SA, based on the understanding, find a way to improve the disaster response effectiveness, and quantitatively evaluate existing and future disaster response processes. The paper seeks to characterize current disaster response operations by various shortcomings, including inability to access information, lack of coordination, and poor communications. All this makes it difficult to deal with dynamic work demand resulting from disasters.

Design/methodology/approach

A response framework, integrating IT and Civil Engineering components is presented highlighting the relationship between situation awareness, collaboration and performance. Also, the implementation approach is discussed.

Findings

The paper finds that SA is very relevant to ensuring how much a current disaster response system is effective cognitively and physically, and in understanding how well disaster response systems support the responders at both strategic and operational levels.

Practical implications

Support of Civil Engineers and IT components can increase the response performance by facilitating collaboration through improved SA.

Originality/value

The paper presents a comprehensive framework and implementation approach to ensure effectiveness of disaster response operations. The framework ensures high situation awareness while supporting collaboration among first responders, including improved civil engineers' roles and exploiting IT components to collect, analyze, and share information.

Details

Structural Survey, vol. 26 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0263-080X

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 7 October 2014

David Launder and Chad Perry

There has been little research about incident management decision making within real-life, dynamic emergencies such as urban fire settings. So this research addresses the research…

Abstract

Purpose

There has been little research about incident management decision making within real-life, dynamic emergencies such as urban fire settings. So this research addresses the research problem: how do incident managers make decisions in urban fire settings? These decision behaviours cover five areas: assessment of the fireground situation, selection of a decision strategy, determination of incident objectives, deployment and management of firefighting resources and ongoing review of the incident. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Design/methodology/approach

Case research was used to examine management of different types of fires, through in-depth interviews with a range of incident managers.

Findings

This research identified five key behavioural elements associated with incident management in urban fire settings such as their application of a mix of recognition-primed, value based, procedural and formal decision strategies throughout the course of an incident rather than a single style.

Research limitations/implications

The in-depth framework of decision making could provide foundations for later research about other emergency settings. And this research is limited to analytic generalisation (Yin, 2009); so quantitative research such as surveys and large scale interviews could be done to further extend the research for statistical generalisation.

Practical implications

The decision procedures uncovered in this research will assist incident managers in many emergencies, assist policy making and foster the development of future incident managers.

Originality/value

The findings expand the knowledge of how incident managers develop situation awareness, make decisions and plans, implement them, and review the incident as it evolves. Another contribution is the comprehensive framework of decision making developed from these findings.

Details

International Journal of Emergency Services, vol. 3 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 2047-0894

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 29 March 2013

Waskitho Wibisono, Arkady Zaslavsky and Sea Ling

The recent advances of mobile computing and sensing technologies have enabled mobile devices to individually sense environment context and develop situation awareness capability…

Abstract

Purpose

The recent advances of mobile computing and sensing technologies have enabled mobile devices to individually sense environment context and develop situation awareness capability. To gain a better understanding of the environment, mobile devices that are co‐located can establish a mobile peer‐to‐peer (MP2P) environment to share their individual context information. The purpose of this paper is to propose a theoretical model for representing and reasoning about situations using uncertain context information captured by multiple devices in an MP2P environment.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper proposes a generic model for reasoning about situations using uncertain context information captured by multiple devices in a MP2P environment. A data fusion technique is then integrated into the proposed model. To deal with uncertainty of context information captured by multiple independent devices, several models to estimate reliability of context information captured in the environment is proposed and developed.

Findings

The proposed model has been implemented as a middleware and evaluated using data from real experiments in various scenarios and environment settings. The results of the experiments show the robust performances of the proposed model as the basis for situation reasoning in the environment.

Originality/value

A novel model to represent situations and context information captured by multiple devices and to estimate reliability context information used for situation reasoning is proposed. The proposed model is then implemented as a middleware and validated using context data taken captured by multiple independent devices in a MP2P environment.

Details

International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communications, vol. 9 no. 1
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1742-7371

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 2 November 2015

Thomas J. Huggins, Stephen R Hill, Robin Peace and David M. Johnston

Emergency management groups aiming to address community resilience work with complex systems which consist of multiple interacting dynamics. The purpose of this paper is to help…

Abstract

Purpose

Emergency management groups aiming to address community resilience work with complex systems which consist of multiple interacting dynamics. The purpose of this paper is to help ensure that information is displayed in a way which supports strategic performance, to address longer term challenges faced by these groups.

Design/methodology/approach

Ten professional emergency managers completed an online simulation of complex, community resilience related tasks faced in their normal working lives. They responded to either table-or diagram-based information about a relevant emergency management strategy. Responses were rated by academic and practitioner experts using 0-5 point Likert scales.

Findings

Analyses of the expert ratings found that certain components of macrocognitive performance reached large degrees of inter-rater reliability (ρ=0.76, p=0.003; ρ=0.58, p=0.03; ρ=0.53, p=0.05). Current situation awareness increased by an average of 29 per cent in the diagram condition. Prospective amendment quality also increased, by an average of 38 per cent. A small sample size meant that these increases are difficult to generalise.

Research limitations/implications

Extensions of this pilot research could use larger samples and more generic simulation conditions, to increase confidence in the claim that certain displays help improve strategic emergency management planning.

Practical implications

It is recommended that further research continues to focus on current and prospective situational awareness, as measures of strategic emergency management performance which can be reliably expert rated.

Originality/value

This research provides novel methodological considerations for supporting a more strategic approach to emergency management, with a focus on longer term implications.

Details

Disaster Prevention and Management, vol. 24 no. 5
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0965-3562

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 8 June 2012

Ana Marilza Pernas, Alicia Diaz, Regina Motz and José Palazzo Moreira de Oliveira

The broader adoption of the internet along with web‐based systems has defined a new way of exchanging information. That advance added by the multiplication of mobile devices has…

Abstract

Purpose

The broader adoption of the internet along with web‐based systems has defined a new way of exchanging information. That advance added by the multiplication of mobile devices has required systems to be even more flexible and personalized. Maybe because of that, the traditional teaching‐controlled learning style has given up space to a new way of learning, which is more flexible and adequate to the learners needs. The purpose of this research is to go further into the semantic modeling of adaptive web based learning systems. Particularly, the paper focuses on those learning systems that consider in their definition the awareness of student's context in order to properly react to the student needs.

Design/methodology/approach

In this paper the authors introduce a semantic model of the student context in terms of an ontology network. This semantic model is explored in order to detect the “current situation” of students when they are navigating into e‐learning environments. The final objective is to enrich the adaptation functionality of e‐learning environments, being able to evaluate context data from personal profile, learning domain and technological situation.

Findings

In order to evaluate the semantic model defined, examples of detected situations are shown in accordance to specific e‐learning scenarios.

Originality/value

The paper covers definition of a flexible and modularized model by using ontology networks, which can be easily modified to incorporate new knowledge data, aiding the modeling of concepts from different learning environments.

Details

Interactive Technology and Smart Education, vol. 9 no. 2
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1741-5659

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 31 August 2012

Liming Chen and Parisa Rashidi

The purpose of this paper is to provide a view on situation, activity and goal awareness (SAGAware) in ubiquitous computing. It discusses these concepts, articulates their roles…

439

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this paper is to provide a view on situation, activity and goal awareness (SAGAware) in ubiquitous computing. It discusses these concepts, articulates their roles in scalability and prevalence of pervasive applications, and speculates the future development.

Design/methodology/approach

The paper is a visionary essay that introduces the background, elaborates the basic concepts and presents the authors' views and insights into SAGAware research in pervasive computing based on the latest state of the art of the development of pervasive computing and its applications.

Findings

SAGAware is closely related to the levels of automation and large‐scale uptake of pervasive applications. It is an interdisciplinary research area requiring collaboration and cooperation of multiple research communities.

Research limitations/implications

The paper highlights the importance of the SAGAware research and further points out research trends and future research directions.

Practical implications

The paper helps stimulate research interests and draw attention of relevant researchers to this promising research area.

Originality/value

The paper pioneers the investigation of an increasingly important research theme, and presents an in‐depth view to its potentials and research trends.

Details

International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communications, vol. 8 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1742-7371

Keywords

Content available
Article
Publication date: 1 August 2000

656

Abstract

Details

Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, vol. 72 no. 4
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0002-2667

Keywords

Article
Publication date: 3 August 2015

Caroline Millman, Dan Rigby, Davey Jones and Gareth Edwards-Jones

Food poisoning attributable to the home generates a large disease burden, yet is an unregulated and largely unobserved domain. Investigating food safety awareness and routine…

Abstract

Purpose

Food poisoning attributable to the home generates a large disease burden, yet is an unregulated and largely unobserved domain. Investigating food safety awareness and routine practices is fraught with difficulties. The purpose of this paper is to develop and apply a new survey tool to elicit awareness of food hazards. Data generated by the approach are analysed to investigate the impact of oberservable heterogeneity on food safety awareness.

Design/methodology/approach

The authors develop a novel Watch-and-Click survey tool to assess the level of awareness of a set of hazardous food safety behaviours in the domestic kitchen. Participants respond to video footage stimulus, in which food hazards occur, via mouse clicks/screen taps. This real-time response data is analysed via estimation of count and logit models to investigate how hazard identification patterns vary over observable characteristics.

Findings

User feedback regarding the Watch-and-Click tool approach is extremely positive. Substantive results include significantly higher hazard awareness among the under 60s. People who thought they knew more than the average person did indeed score higher but people with food safety training/experience did not. Vegetarians were less likely to identify four of the five cross-contamination hazards they observed.

Originality/value

A new and engaging survey tool to elicit hazard awareness with real-time scores and feedback is developed, with high levels of user engagement and stakeholder interest. The approach may be applied to elicit hazard awareness in a wide range of contexts including education, training and research.

Details

British Food Journal, vol. 117 no. 8
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 0007-070X

Keywords

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