Digital Procedural Skill Retention for Selected M1A2 Tank Inter-Vehicular Information System (IVIS) Tasks

The U.S. Army Force 21 program makes extensive use of digital communications technologies to speed the exchange of information among all operational levels. While digital communications offers great potential, anecdotal reports from field trials and testing repeatedly state that the basic procedural skills needed to operate these systems are highly perishable. The present research developed estimates of digital procedural skill retention for the tasks of creating and sending digital map overlays and reports, using the M1A2 Abrams tank Inter-Vehicular Information System. Twenty-eight soldiers received instruction based on the M1A2 New Equipment Training Team lesson plan, followed by an immediate evaluation of task performance, and a follow-on evaluation 30 days later. Results showed a 52 percent reduction in the number of soldiers able to create and send digital map overlays alter the 30 day delay, and a 23 percent reduction in the number able to create and send digital reports. Methods for measuring skill decay are presented, and an approach to identify performance errors is provided.