ABSTRACT
The design of advanced information management systems does not only represent a technical challenge for computer scientists and engineers, it also represents a difficult task for human factors specialists. The job of human factors specialists is to help design systems such that they are safe, efficient, and comfortable to use (Helander, 2006). In multimodal information management, a particular challenge for human factors is associated with the design of such systems for teams rather than individual users (Bowers et al., 2006). The change from one-person use to multi-person use has a number of important implications since it requires examining additional issues that are not relevant for single-user system usage. This includes the need for communication, shared mental models (i.e., several users need to have the same understanding of the current situation), and allocation of tasks between users (i.e., who is best suited to perform a given task).
