stead, the two pilots each have small joysticks, not unlike the ones used for
computer games. The captain has a small joystick on the left side of the air-
plane, controlled with the left hand. The first officer has a small joystick on the
right side of the airplane, controlled with the right hand. Unlike the control
wheels of traditional aircraft, which are interconnected so that one turns along
with the other, these two joysticks are independent. They could both be used at
once, without either pilot noticing. The airplane’s computer decides which one
to follow.
Taking this idea a step further, the American National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA) has a prototvpe advanced cockpit in its simulator
facilities at the Ames Research Center in California that has a typewriter key-
board in front of each pilot. Make those controls smaller and you could free up
a lot of space for the pilots. Then you could even enlarge the windows, so they
could see better out the windows as they were flying.
It turns out, though, that those big outdated rooms, those large outdated
controls, offer many benefits. The benefits are important to the distributed na-
ture of the job. Although many modern plants and most airplanes can be con-
trolled by a single person, when problems arise, it is valuable to have several
people around, the better to share the work load, the better to make decisions.
The critical thing about doing shared tasks is to keep everyone informed
about the complete state of things. The technical term for this issituation aware-
ness: Each pilot or member of the control team must be fully aware of the situ-
ation, of what has happened, what is planned. And here is where those big
controls come in handy.
When the captain reaches across the cockpit over to the first officer’s side and
lowers the landing-gear lever, the motion is obvious: The first officer can see it
even without paying conscious attention. The motion not only controls the
landing gear, but just as important, it acts as a natural communication between
the two pilots, letting both know the action has been done. In fact, the motion
helps the captain remember that the task was done: Flip a bunch of tiny
switches and it might be hard to remember whether the landing-gear switch
was flipped. Lean over and pull down a huge lever and the memory of that
muscle movement is distinct and retained. The same with the control wheels:
When one pilot moves the controls, the other pilot knows it. Automatically,
naturally, without any need for talking.
Now consider the two small joysticks used in the all-electronic Airbus air-
craft. Many who study aviation are very concerned about the unintended side
effects of these sticks: The natural communication between the two pilots is
lost. There is no way for one pilot to tell whether the other pilot is controlling
the airplane except by asking. There have already been instances of confusion,
in which each pilot thought the other was controlling the plane, whereas in fact
neither was. In other cases, both thought they were in control at the same time.
Neither situation is good. The same problems do occur with the control wheels,
but those problems can be detected rapidly, for the movement (or lack of
movement) of the wheels presents large visible cues. Moreover, it is easy to
look over at the other pilot and check for a hand on the wheel or other large
controls; it is not so easy to see whether the hand is on the small, side-mounted
joystick.
Distributed Cognition 445