Re: [Phys-L] multitasking

[brian whatcott <betwys1@sbcglobal.net>]

Despite John D,s spirited defense of multi-tasking and its teachability, 
and despite
 John C's likening it to the behavior associated with ADDS, I believe 
that the experimental
data long available on the effects of an unexpected interruption on a 
task requiring
 concentration (call it  a cognitive effort if you will) are rather 
convincing:
performance declines.    This year, and every few years you will hear of 
a pilot
 crashing a plane when a door or hatch opens unexpectedly in flight.
  The damn things fly perfectly well with all kinds of stuff flapping 
in the breeze,
 but the distraction overwhelms.

The situation for some pilots is rather like that: they may be shaken around
 (which invokes those genetic propensities inherited from tree-dwellers?
perhaps to attend to finding something to hang onto?) and may be 
assailed with noisy
 engine sounds:  they need to look out and look down and look round and
 fold charts and punch mini keyboards - and yes, Dorothy - they  may fly
hands off, feet on, at times). It's for this kind of reason that people 
caution
students that their apparent IQ is halved when airborne.

There are methods to mitigate the drop in performance - useful recipes 
for people who can
get into deathly trouble with minor inattention - people like surgeons. 
It's the use of checklists:
this reduces the cognitive conscious effort to a rote behavior which 
pulls up performance
 considerably and avoids leaving swabs and clamps in patients.

Checklists have always been advocated for pilots - so that a student 
from long ago would
 remember a vital action checklist  like this one:
Brakes off, undercarriage down, mixture rich, air cold, prop pitch fine,
fuel on Mains and sufficient, flaps as required, harness and hatches 
secure..
 [You might well ask, what's an undercarriage, what is a propeller 
fine/coarse control??)

The current incarnation of checklist advocacy stresses using the 
appropriate written
 not memorized version.

Is using a cell phone like talking to a passenger? I think not: you look 
down to select
a target for your call, and worse, continue to look down if you are 
texting. But that
last is just personal opinion.

Brian W



On 6/7/2012 9:55 PM, John Denker wrote:
> As Harry Emerson Fosdick was fond of saying:
>
>              The person saying it can't be done
>              is liable to be interrupted
>              by the person doing it.
>
> Multitasking -- aka division of attention -- can be done.  I get paid
> to do it.  I get paid to teach other people how to do it.
>
> Here's a /simplified/ description of one scenario:  You are flying
> the "downwind" leg of the airport traffic pattern.
>    http://www.cfidarren.com/r-approachland2.jpg
> You are looking out the window so as to see and avoid other traffic.
/snip interesting post/