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13.3 Understanding and Maintaining Situational Awareness 311

VetBooks.ir ● Use all required safety equipment to pro- information, now and in the future. In more
detail, situational awareness clarifies what is
tect them when training animals.
● Keep focused whilst they are training or needed for reaching the goals of a specific
acting as a backup; understand and main- job by understanding what important infor-
tain ‘situational awareness’. mation is to be used in the decision‐making
process. In fact, this means ‘only those pieces
of information that are relevant to the task
at hand are important for Situational
13.3 Understanding and Awareness’ (Endsley 1993). Formally, situa-
Maintaining Situational tional awareness has been defined by Endsley
Awareness (1988, 1995, Endsley and Garland 2000) as
‘the perception of the elements in the envi-
Zoo professionals operate in complex and ronment within a volume of time and space,
dynamic environments. Training settings the comprehension of their meaning and the
can vary depending on the species, but most projection of their status in the near future’.
are different than the ones humans live in. The formal definition of situational aware-
With few exceptions, most species behave ness is categorised into three hierarchical
and make decisions at a higher tempo than phases: perception of elements in current
the average zoo professional. Add in multi- situation; comprehension of current situa-
ple animals and numerous environmental tion; and projection of future status. The
variables and the zoo professional’s mental relationships between these phases and indi-
resources can quickly be challenged. vidual factors including the dynamic state of
Effective training is about being prepared the working environment, decisions of the
and making good, timely decisions in the individual, and their resulting actions are
moment. The ability to do this consistently illustrated in Figure 13.1.
and in a variety of training situations will Endsley et al. (1998) have expanded these
lead to good training. These same qualities hierarchical phases as follows:
can also keep you safe. Situational awareness
is a concept that grew out of the need to 13.3.1 Level 1 Situational Awareness:
make good, safe decisions in complex and Perception of the Elements in the
dynamic working environment, like those Environment
that airline pilots encounter. A widely
accepted definition of situational awareness ‘The first step in achieving situational
is, ‘knowing what is going on so you can fig- awareness involves perceiving the status,
ure out what to do’ (Adam 1993). Essentially, attributes, and dynamics of relevant ele-
situational awareness is having awareness ments in the environment. For example, a
about what is happening around you, in pilot needs to accurately perceive informa-
order to make decisions based on that tion about his/her aircraft and its systems

Feedback

Level 1 Level 2 Level 3
State of Perception of Comprehension Projection
Environment environmental of current of future Decision Performance
of actions
situation
status
elements
Situational awareness
Figure 13.1 Endsley’s model of situational awareness. Source: adapted from Endsley (1995).