Proceedings of the Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society

The Operator Model Architecture (OMAR) provides a computational framework in which to develop human performance models that generate reasonable multiple-task behaviors. An interdisciplinary foundation that reached beyond the experimental psychology and artificial intelligence literatures was considered essential to the construction of successful models. Brain imaging and clinical studies suggest that tasks are accomplished through the coordinated execution of function-specific perceptual, cognitive and motor capabilities. These studies together with philosophically grounded cautions, further suggest that the mediation of task contention be accomplished in a framework that does not require an executive that manages task execution. The computational framework for building models sensitive to these considerations is described. Examples from a commercial air traffic control domain are used to illustrate OMAR modeling capabilities.