Use of Perspective View Displays for Operational Tasks

Abstract : Research on when and how to use three-dimensional (3-D) perspective views on flat screens for military operational tasks such as air traffic control is confusing and contradictory. This report considers the basic qualities and capabilities of two-dimensional (2-D) and 3-D views. Two experiments were conducted. Because perspective views integrate all the dimensions, it was hypothesized that 3-D views are better for object understanding. In contrast, it was hypothesized that 2-D views are better for judging the relative position of objects because each dimension can be isolated. Participants viewed simple block shapes in 2-D or 3-D and either performed an object understanding task (e.g., identification, mental rotation) or a relative position task (e.g., directions and distances between objects). This report concludes that a 3-D perspective view was far superior to 2-D views for understanding the shape of the simple blocks, but 2-D views were better than 3-D views for comprehending the relative position of two objects.