Collaboration in the Flightdeck: Opportunities for Interaction Design

Computer applications are given increasingly complex functions to operate in multifaceted collaborative environments. The more capability and responsibility that is given to ‘computational agents’, the more we need to consider them as ‘collaborators’ in carrying out complex, shared tasks. In the aviation domain, for example, pilots are expected to monitor, anticipate and manage partially autonomous systems, which is increasingly problematic. Instead of designing such monitoring tasks, they should be considered as collaborative tasks and designed appropriately. We, as designers, are faced with the challenge of understanding and shaping such collaborative systems. This paper illustrates how the perspective of considering the interaction between the Flight Management System and the (pilot) user as a collaborative activity can uncover design opportunities – by conducting an analysis of interaction failures that contributed to the Cali air accident.