The occlusion technique: a procedure to assess the HMI of in-vehicle information and communication systems

Pilots’ gaze strategies and manual control performance using occlusion as a measurement technique during a simulated manual flight task

“…Examples for such non-or low cognitive tasks in parallel to the primary flying task are checks of the engines or short glances to the outside while checking the visibility of the runway. Because occlusion interrupts visual perception but not cognition (Monk et al 2002;Gelau and Krems 2004), the occluded time intervals have presumably been used for further cognitive processing, thus supporting the manual flying task, and there was an interruption of visual contact but no complete interruption of information processing. However, the extent to which an effect of preemption (Helleberg and Wickens 2003) seizes only these cognitive phases remains unanswered.…”

“…Gray et al (2008) have taken the occlusion paradigm in a different way: in a manual fine-motor flying task to maintain a constant altitude, they occluded the ground surface by 3D objects. In the current study, the benefit compared to more intense techniques such as eye tracking is that occlusion allows for a very selective and controlled manipulation of an operator's visual perception, which is a very important channel for many psychomotor control tasks (Helleberg and Wickens 2003;Gelau and Krems 2004) with a clear distinction between the information a subject should receive and the information to be ignored.…”

Skill Acquisition While Operating In-Vehicle Information Systems: Interface Design Determines the Level of Safety-Relevant Distractions

“…Thus, IVIS designers face the challenge of creating interfaces that can be used with minimal training, keep task times short, and do not create high cognitive demands. Furthermore, interface designers have to take into account the user's need to time-share focal vision with driving and that the driving task may demand full attention at any time, which would result in prolonged interruptions of the in-vehicle task (Baumann, Keinath, Krems, & Bengler, 2004;Gelau & Krems, 2004).…”

R We Fooling Ourselves: Does the Occlusion Technique Shortchange R Estimates?

“…In fact, a special issue of Applied Ergonomics dedicated to the technique was published in 2004 (see Gelau & Krems, 2004). In that issue, Bauman, Keinath, Krems, and Bengler (2004) applied the occlusion technique to a navigation destination entry task, and compared the results to performance on the same task while driving.…”

“…Recently, the technique was adopted as a means to estimate the visual demand of invehicle devices (see Gelau & Krems, 2004) and has been introduced by the International Standards Organization (ISO) as a standard for assessing visual demand from in-vehicle systems (ISO, 2007). With the increasing incorporation of advanced driver assistance technologies into the driver's visual, cognitive, and physical sphere, the need arose to provide designers and evaluators with a means of assessing whether these new devices imposed too great a demand on the driver's visual resources.…”