Yoked Design and Secondary Task in Adaptive Training

This paper describes two methodological innovations in the study of adaptive training. The first is the use of a yoked design to insure that the average level of task difficulty for fixed-difficulty subjects is the same as the average level of difficulty reached by adaptive subjects. The second is the demonstration of the feasibility of using a secondary (subsidiary, non-loading) task to furnish the adaptive criterion for changing the difficulty level of the primary task. The results of two experiments are reported. Both experiments demonstrate the feasibility and utility of yoked design and adaptation on secondary task performance in adaptive training.