Understanding the Utility of Digital Flight Assistants: A Preliminary Analysis

Interactions with intelligent systems have become common in domestic and professional life. However, little is known about how pilots, who already work in a highly automated environment, envisage using intelligent systems in their work environment. This preliminary analysis investigates pilots’ needs and wants for digital flight assistants (DFAs) through an interview study. We show that the adoption of DFAs may be hindered by pre-existing concerns, such as inadequate automatic speech recognition, linked to past experiences with digital assistants. Furthermore, we identify important contextual and environmental factors that will need to be accounted for in the design of DFAs such as “cross cockpit” relationships, noisy environments, or pilot’s cognitive workload.