Enhancing Pilot-Autopilot Collaboration in Cruising Operations Through Task Allocation: A Psychophysiological Approach

Automation turned pilots into supervisors during cruising, where pilots might experience a decline in vigilance over time and eventually be delinked from the control loop, posing a significant safety threat to flight operations. This research seeks a cockpit automation solution that balances human and task performance with a minimal tradeoff in cognitive workload. Twenty-four cadet pilots performed three flights representing different levels of automation (fully automated, auto-thrust disengaged, and manual flight) on an A320 flight simulator. A performance index was proposed to evaluate human and task performance in each level of automation. Compared to the fully automated flight, results from EEG indicated that disengaging auto-thrust raises pilots’ awareness and concentration while reducing pilots’ drowsiness. The reaction time was also significantly shorter when auto-thrust was disengaged with a nonsignificant cognitive workload increase. Our study empirically concluded that an effective task distribution enhances human-automation teaming and provides design insights on cockpit automations.