ABSTRACT
An attempt was made to model the overt activity and cognitive processes of air traffic control officers. Several theories relating to decision making, adaptive control and expertise were assessed, of which the naturalistic decision making (NDM) approach was found to offer the most useful framework for creating this model. An analysis of physiological measures was performed to validate these findings. In line with the predictions of NDM theory, it was found that measured effort was more closely related to data load than to the number of interventions made by the controllers.
