Content, Variety, and Augmentation of Simulated Visual Scenes for Teaching Air-to-Ground Attack

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Abstract
The Visual Technology Research Simulator was used for a quasi-transfer-of-training study in which 32 military pilots were taught to deliver bombs from a 30-deg dive. Scene content had a strong and consistent effect on performance and on differential transfer. A landscape scene that contained buildings, roads, and rectangular fields was better than a schematic grid pattern for both training and transfer. Scene variety in training did not benefit transfer, and there is a distinct possibility that it can interfere with early learning. Augmented feedback proved to be a potent instructional variable, but one that showed complex effects. It helped inexperienced pilots with their dive pitch control, and it helped the more experienced pilots with their longitudinal bombing error. The data presented here have strong implications for design and use of flight training simulators in that they indicate the importance of scene content and augmented feedback as training variables.