NeoCITIES: an experimental test-bed for quantifying the effects of cognitive aids on team performance in C2 situations

In this paper, we describe the design and development of the NeoCITIES Simulation task environment. The enhanced NeoCITIES environment allows repeatable experiments in which artifacts are introduced to improve team performance and measure quantities such as inference accuracy as a function of crisis tempo, data rate, decision complexity and individual factors such as induced stress. NeoCITIES was developed to study the effectiveness of cognitive artifacts within a simulated command and control environment. This paper describes the initial results of a human in the loop experiment to quantify the effects of data overload on human analyst performance. The experiment involves the introduction of cognitive aids to support improved team coordination and understanding of team-member interactions in a simulated extreme events scenario.