Air-defense experiments

Last updated October 15, 2019

The Air-defense experiments were a series of management science experiments performed between 1952 and 1954 by RAND Corporation's Systems Research Laboratory. The experiments were designed to provide information about organizational learning and how teams improved their performance through practice.

RAND Corporation is an American nonprofit global policy think tank created in 1948 by Douglas Aircraft Company to offer research and analysis to the United States Armed Forces. It is financed by the U.S. government and private endowment, corporations, universities and private individuals. The company has grown to assist other governments, international organizations, private companies and foundations, with a host of defense and non-defense issues, including healthcare. RAND aims for interdisciplinary and quantitative problem solving by translating theoretical concepts from formal economics and the physical sciences into novel applications in other areas, using applied science and operations research.

Organizational learning is the process of creating, retaining, and transferring knowledge within an organization. An organization improves over time as it gains experience. From this experience, it is able to create knowledge. This knowledge is broad, covering any topic that could better an organization. Examples may include ways to increase production efficiency or to develop beneficial investor relations. Knowledge is created at four different units: individual, group, organizational, and inter organizational.

Experiment structure

The series was constructed from four different experiments (code named Casey, Cowboy, Cobra, and Cogwheel). The first of these (Casey) used college students as crew for the air defense scenario whilst members of the United States Air Force were used in the latter experiments. For each of the four experiments different structures and timespans were used:

A college is an educational institution or a constituent part of one. A college may be a degree-awarding tertiary educational institution, a part of a collegiate or federal university, an institution offering vocational education or a secondary school.

The United States Air Force (USAF) is the aerial and space warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is one of the seven American uniformed services. Initially formed as a part of the United States Army on 1 August 1907, the USAF was established as a separate branch of the U.S. Armed Forces on 18 September 1947 with the passing of the National Security Act of 1947. It is the youngest branch of the U.S. Armed Forces, and the fourth in order of precedence. The USAF is the largest and most technologically advanced air force in the world. The Air Force articulates its core missions as air and space superiority, global integrated intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, rapid global mobility, global strike, and command and control.

Casey: 28 college students, 54 4-hour sessions
Cowboy: 39 Air Force officers and airmen, 22 8-hour sessions
Cobra: 40 Air Force officers and airmen, 22 8-hour sessions
Cogwheel: 33 Air Force officers and airmen, 14 4-hour sessions

An officer is a member of an armed forces or uniformed service who holds a position of authority.

An airman is a member of an air force or air arm of a nation's armed forces. In certain air forces, it can also refer to a specific enlisted rank.

Purpose

The purpose of the experiments was to examine how teams of men operated in an environment composed of complex information flows making decisions under conditions of high stress. The experimental design was to simulate an air defense control center in which the team was presented with simulated radar images showing air traffic as well as simulated telephone conversations with outside agencies reporting additional information (such as the availability of interceptor aircraft or confirmation of civilian aircraft).^[1]

A team is a group of individuals working together to achieve their goal.

Information that which informs; the answer to a question of some kind; that from which data and knowledge can be derived

Information can be thought of as the resolution of uncertainty; it is that which answers the question of "what an entity is" and thus defines both its essence and nature of its characteristics. It is associated with data, as data represents values attributed to parameters, and information is data in context and with meaning attached. Information relates also to knowledge, as knowledge signifies understanding of an abstract or concrete concept.

Radar is a detection system that uses radio waves to determine the range, angle, or velocity of objects. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. A radar system consists of a transmitter producing electromagnetic waves in the radio or microwaves domain, a transmitting antenna, a receiving antenna and a receiver and processor to determine properties of the object(s). Radio waves from the transmitter reflect off the object and return to the receiver, giving information about the object's location and speed.

Results and conclusions

The experiment series generated a great deal of both qualitative and quantitative data and the results of earlier experiments were used to improve the experimental apparatus and organization for later versions of the experiment.

The first experiment (Casey) was conducted with college students from which it was determined that culture was a large factor in team as well as individual performance. While an attempt had been made to approximate a military culture in the college student team, the researchers decided that use of actual military personnel would provide more success. Hence later experiments used exclusively servicemen.

Culture Social behavior and norms found in society

Culture is an umbrella term which encompasses the social behavior and norms found in human societies, as well as the knowledge, beliefs, arts, laws, customs, capabilities and habits of the individuals in these groups.

A military is a heavily-armed, highly organised force primarily intended for warfare, also known collectively as armed forces. It is typically officially authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with its members identifiable by their distinct military uniform. It may consist of one or more military branches such as an Army, Navy, Air Force and in certain countries, Marines and Coast Guard. The main task of the military is usually defined as defence of the state and its interests against external armed threats.

A soldier is one who fights as part of an army. A soldier can be a conscripted or volunteer enlisted person, a non-commissioned officer, or an officer.

The original experimental design was to provide a particular level of difficulty to determine how well the air-defense team was able learn the individual tasks as well as the intra-team coordination needed to be successful at the air-defense task. The research team also modified the experimental design after the results of Casey, these indicated that crews were able to learn rapidly and were able to accommodate the level of difficulty, within a few sessions, to an effective level.^[2]

Beginning with Cowboy, the air-defense crews were presented with a series of sessions each of which had a higher task load than the previous session. The task load was made up of two variables, kind and number of hostile aircraft and characteristics of friendly traffic (among which the hostile aircraft were sprinkled).

In the report on these experiments co-authors Chapman, Kennedy, Newell, and Biel (1959) write that:

“

the four [experimental] organizations behaved like organisms. Not only did the experiments provide graphic demonstrations of how much performance difference resulted from learning, but they also showed how differently the same people used the same tools under essentially the same load conditions at different times. The structures and procedures that glued functional components together so changed that an organization was only nominally the same from day to day.

”

Footnotes

↑ The experiment report (see references) notes that: Thus, the input to the center contains detailed, redundant information about a few very important events and many unimportant events in its task environment.
↑ Once again the report concludes that: the college students were maintaining highly effective defense of their area while playing word games and doing homework on the side.

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References

Chapman, Robert L.; Kennedy, John L.; Newell, A.; Biel, William C. (April 1959). "The Systems Research Laboratory's Air Defense Experiments". Management Science . 5 (3).