Augmented Reality Annotations for Assisting with Decision-Making and Time-Critical Tasking

This research explores various Augmented Reality (AR) annotations for supporting performance and decision-making in a time-critical task. The task was designed in collaboration with defence contacts to mimic a command and control scenario, requiring rapid decisions under time pressure. A set of annotations was derived from previous literature, and modifications were made to suit the tasking requirements. The annotations chosen were based on their level of abstraction from least to most abstract: Animations, StickyNotes, Icons, and Highlights. The study compared five conditions (Animations, StickyNotes, Icons, Highlights, and no annotations) for their effectiveness in supporting performance and decision-making in a time-critical task. StickyNotes was found to be the most effective for supporting performance. The study’s results also identify that annotations for assisting with time-critical tasking should be easy and quick to understand, contain sufficient complexity, and not be too abstract in detail.