Development of a New Pilot Workload Rating Scale

Pilot workload assessment has been a keen area of research for many years and has key applicability in flight testing. This paper outlines the development of a novel workload rating scale and index, the Comeau-Duggan Pilot Workload Index, which bridges gaps, such as causal factor identification, between some of the most widely used rating scales in flight test. The conceptualization and evolution of this index has been a multi-year and multi-nation research effort that has built upon the foundation and fundamental principles that underpin current widely accepted workload rating scales used in Human Factors and Handling Qualities engineering. The pilot workload index facilitates a rigorous and robust methodology for identifying the factors contributing to a given flying task, quantifying their impact through a structured suffix flowchart approach. It can provide, for example, a quantifiable link between pilot workload and the operational use of the aircraft, and therefore could inform aircraft and system design, as well as tactics and procedural development. It was developed through flight trials conducted at the National Research Council of Canada and flight simulator trials conducted at the University of Liverpool.