The negative effects of interruptions on task performance in modern work environments are well documented. However, in most time-critical supervisory-level tasks such as emergency response and mission command and control, interruptions to supervisors may contain valuable information necessary for the execution of the task. In such cases, supervisors may need assistance to manage or recover from interruptions as efficiently and effectively as possible. This paper reviews the relevant interruption management and recovery literature to identify opportunities for research.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
AltmannE. M.TraftonJ. G. (2002). Memory for goals: An activation-based model, Cognitive Science, 26, 39-83
2.
AltmannE. M.TraftonJ. G. (2004). Task interruption: Resumption lag and the role of cues, in: ForbusK.GentnerD.RegierT. (Eds.) Proceedings of the 26th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society (CogSci 2004), Mahwah: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 43-48
3.
BaileyB. P.AdamczykP. D.ChangT. Y.ChilsonN. A. (2006) A framework for specifying and monitoring user tasks, Computers in Human Behavior, 22 (4), 709-732
4.
CavanaughJ.WurtzR. H. (2004). Subcortical modulation of attention counters change blindness. The Journal of Neuroscience, 24(50), 11236-11243
5.
CellierJ.-M.EyrolleH. (1992). Interference between switched tasks, Ergonomics, 35 (1), 25-36
6.
CookeN.J.GormanJ.C. (2006). Assessment of team cognition. In KarwowskiP. (Ed.), 2nd EDITION-International Encyclopedia of Ergonomics and Human Factors (pp. 270-275). UK: Taylor & Francis Ltd.
7.
CookeN. J.GormanJ.PedersenH.BellB. (2007). Distributed Mission Environments: Effects of Geographic Dispersion on Team Cognition and Performance. FioreS.SalasE. (Eds.), Toward a science of distributed learning (pp. 147-167). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
8.
CzerwinskiM.CutrellE.HorvitzE. (2000). Instant messaging: Effects of relevance and time, in: TurnerS.TurnerP. (Eds.), People and Computers XIV: Proceedings of HCI 2000, Vol. 2, British Computer Society, 71-76
9.
DabbishL.KrautR. (2004) Controlling interruptions: Awareness displays and social motivation for coordination, in: Proceedings of the ACM Conference on Computer Supported Cooperative Work, New York: ACM Press, 182-191
10.
GillieT.BroadbentD. (1989) What makes interruptions disruptive?A study of length, similarity and complexity, Psychological Research, 50 (4), 243-250
11.
HughesJ. A.RandallD.ShapiroD. (1992). Faltering from ethnography to design. In ACM (Ed.), Proceedings of CSCW’92 Computer-Supported Cooperative Work.
12.
JettQ. R.GeorgeJ.M. (2003). Work interrupted: A closer look at the role of interruptions in organizational life. Acad. of Manage. Rev., 28 (3), 494-507
13.
KirmeyerS. L. (1988). Coping with competing demands: Interruptions and the Type A pattern, Journal of Applied Psychology, 73 (4), 621-629
14.
LatorellaK. A. (1998). Effects of modality on interrupted flight deck performance: Implications for data link, in: Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 42nd Annual Meeting, Santa Monica: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 87-91
15.
McFarlaneD. C. (1998) Interruption of People in Human-Computer Interaction, Doctoral Dissertation, George Washington University, Washington
16.
McFarlaneD. C. (2002). Comparison of four primary methods for coordinating the interruption of people in human-computer interaction, HCI, 17, 63–139
17.
MonkC. A.Boehm-DavisD. A.TraftonJ. G. (2004) Recovering from interruptions: Implications for driver distraction research, Human Factors, 46 (4), 650-663
18.
National Transportation Safety Board. (1988). Aircraft accident report, Northwest Airlines Inc., McDonnell-Douglas DC–9–82, N312RC, Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport, Romulus, Michigan (NTSB–AAR–88–05). Washington, DC: National Transportation Safety Board.
19.
OulasvirtaA.SaariluomaP. (2006). Surviving task interruptions: Investigating the implications of long-term working memory theory, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 64 (10), 941-961
20.
RensinkR. A. (2000). Seeing, sensing, and scrutinizing. Vision Research40(10– 12):1469–87
21.
RensinkR. A.O’ReganJ. K.ClarkJ. J. (1997). To see or not to see: The need for attention to perceive changes in scenes. Psychological Science8(5):368– 73
22.
RussellE.PurvisL. M.BanksA. (2007). Describing the strategies used for dealing with email interruptions according to different situational parameters, Computers in Human Behavior, 23 (4), 1820-1837
23.
SasangoharF. (2009). Improving Interruption Recovery in Human-Supervisory Control (HSC). M.A.Sc. Thesis, Systems Design Engineering, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
24.
ScottS.D.MercierS.CummingsM.L.WangE. (2006). Assisting Interruption Recovery in Supervisory Control of Multiple UAVs. In Proceedings of HFES 2006: 50th Annual Meeting of the Human Factors and Ergonomic Society, October 16-20, 2006, San Francisco, CA, USA.
25.
SenS.GeyerW.MullerMMooreM.BrownholtzB.WilcoxE.MillenD.R. (2006). FeedMe: A Collaborative Alert Filtering System, Computer Supported Cooperative Work, Proceedings of the 2006 20th anniversary conference on Computer supported cooperative work. November 4-8, 89-98
26.
SmallmanH. S.JohnM.St. (2003). CHEX (Change History EXplicit): New HCI concepts for change awareness. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 46th Annual MeetingSanta Monica, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 528– 532
27.
JohnM.St.SmallmanH. S.ManesD. I. (2005) Recovery from interruptions to a dynamic monitoring task: The beguiling utility of Instant Replay, in: Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 49th Annual Meeting, Santa Monica: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 473-477
28.
TraftonJ. G.AltmannE. M.BrockD. P. (2005) Huh, what was I doing?How people use environmental cues after an interruption, in: Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 49th Annual Meeting (HFES’05), Santa Monica: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, 468-472
29.
TraftonJ. G.AltmannE. M.BrockD. P.MintzF. E. (2003) Preparing to resume an interrupted task: Effects of prospective goal encoding and retrospective rehearsal, International Journal of Human-Computer Studies, 58 (5), 583-603
30.
Van BergenA. (1968). Task Interruption. Amesterdam: North-Holland Publishing Company
31.
WanJ.ScottS.D.CummingsM.L. (2007). Assisting Interruption Recovery in Mission Control Operations. HAL2007-03, Humans and Automation Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
