History
Although the term itself is fairly recent, the concept has roots in the history of military theory—it is recognizable in Sun Tzu's The Art of War, for instance. The term itself, can be traced also to World War I, where it was recognized as a crucial component for crews in military aircraft (Press, 1986).
Before being widely adopted by human factors scientists in the 1990s, the term was first used by United States Air Force (USAF) fighter aircrew returning from war in Korea and Vietnam (see Watts, 2004). They identified having good SA as the decisive factor in air combat engagements—the "ace factor" (Spick, 1988). Survival in a dogfight was typically a matter of observing the opponent's current move and anticipating his next move a fraction of a second before he could observe and anticipate his own. USAF pilots also came to equate SA with the "observe" and "orient" phases of the famous observe-orient-decide-act loop (OODA Loop) or Boyd cycle, as described by the USAF fighter ace and war theorist Col. John Boyd. In combat, the winning strategy is to "get inside" your opponent's OODA loop, not just by making your own decisions quicker, but also by having better SA than the opponent, and even changing the situation in ways that the opponent cannot monitor or even comprehend. Losing one's own SA, in contrast, equates to being "out of the loop."
Clearly, SA has far reaching applications as it is needed for individuals and teams to function effectively in their environment. Thus, we are beginning to see SA going beyond the field of aviation and work being conducted in a wide variety of domains. Currently, the study of SA is now being examined in such diverse areas as air traffic control, nuclear power plant operation, vehicle operation and anesthesiology (Endsley, 1995b; Gaba, Howard & Small, 1995; Collier & Follesf, 1995; Bolstad, 2000, Sollenberger & Stein, 1995).
Read more about this topic: Situation Awareness
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“I am ashamed to see what a shallow village tale our so-called History is. How many times must we say Rome, and Paris, and Constantinople! What does Rome know of rat and lizard? What are Olympiads and Consulates to these neighboring systems of being? Nay, what food or experience or succor have they for the Esquimaux seal-hunter, or the Kanaka in his canoe, for the fisherman, the stevedore, the porter?”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“You that would judge me do not judge alone
This book or that, come to this hallowed place
Where my friends’ portraits hang and look thereon;
Ireland’s history in their lineaments trace;
Think where man’s glory most begins and ends
And say my glory was I had such friends.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“The history is always the same the product is always different and the history interests more than the product. More, that is, more. Yes. But if the product was not different the history which is the same would not be more interesting.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)