Situational Awareness, Pt. 2

One way of describing the process we can use to transfer SA from conscious to less-conscious control is moving from learning to over-learning. One way of achieving over-learning involves a general strategy to engage in repetition in as many contexts as possible, to facilitate generalization of the process, to make it reflexive and, to some extent, independent of context. Fortunately for us, we are blessed with a brain that does not always effectively distinguish between in-vivo and imaginal experience, a characteristic that we can put to good use. Long-term memory is part and parcel of early recognition, anticipation, activation and expert performance – and transfer to long-term memory is an issue of repetition (long-term potentiation). One way we can train this ability up without having to engage in daily dangerous encounters or gunfights is via the use of visualization. But this is most effective when it is not simply thinking personal defense through with eyes closed in our easy chair. As noted in Part I, we move through our day and the many environments we move in are likely to share commonalities with those in which we might one day find ourselves under threat. To quote General James Mattes - a favorite among personal defense advocates; “Be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet”. Everyone, all the time, no matter where you are. This takes work and mental work can be both effective useful, as we move through our day, allowing us to practice the skill of attending to those around us, evaluating their status in relation to us, and anticipating their movements and actions, and considering high-probability responses to their alternative actions – thus we are training the full sequence of situational awareness and the response cycle on an ongoing basis. We can also visualize alternative actions those around us might take and anticipate our possible responses and their effects. In order to effectively create automatic responding we need repetition – to both move from learning to over-learning, from the need for conscious mediation to more automatic processing and to associate these “habits” of attention, search, evaluation and anticipation with as many different environments as possible (common and specific patterns). We also need to link these processes to some number of stereotypical responses. In the end, this achieves an end state that is often called “unconscious competence”.

In general then we want to develop general skills of anticipation; it may be that our best approach to this skill on a daily basis is to play a sort of “what happens next” game. To do so, we have to attend, to see what is happening around us, who is in our AO, what they are doing. Second, we need to accurately ascertain their status in relation to us (make a threat assessment); are they moving toward or away, focusing on us or distracted, looking elsewhere, where are their hands, do they appear hostile, making furtive or rapid movement, moving with purpose, aggressive, passive, do they stand out from the baseline? Are there indications they are armed? In most cases, thankfully, the answer will be “No”, but this is a process we need to ingrain into our daily activities. Lastly, ask ourselves “What happens next?” - can we project their movements in relation to us into the near future? Can we predict these with some degree of probability based on our experience? Can we envision an action we would take based on several different projections as a function of probability? [Assess, alarm, avoid, assault] It has been noticed that this type of exercise can often be done while driving and while it does have some inherent limitations (e.g., it is a less likely scenario for an assault, its similarity to a wide range of assault contexts is limited) it can be useful in honing general skills of attention, awareness, anticipation, and, when required, action. One recommendation made when training situational awareness via driving is the use of Commentary Driving – to actually talk our way through our travels, to notice who and what are around us, and to actively recount them in commentary out loud. Of course, it is a small step from this commentary to adding a layer of prediction, not only that we note behavior in our environment, but predict with some degree of probability that this car will likely move into our lane, that car will probably pull out in front of us, this driver is texting, and so on. So we actively observe, predict, prepare, and act if necessary. Our best bet in such practice is to most often focus, in addition to most probable events, on predictions that present the highest level of threat to our own safety. Hence, we would most closely focus on and prepare for the prediction that a car is going to swerve into our lane than that it will not; our predictions reflect both probability and threat. Low probability events become meaningful when the potential threat (harm) associated with them is high. It is the predicted behaviors that have implications for our safety that are paramount in our SA.

Another way to potentially interpret the reactions that de Becker suggested are important for us to attend to is to see them as expectancy violations. There is ample research that, even in rats, when an expectation is violated (in essence, when an anticipated sequence of events does not follow predictions flowing from accumulated experience – what might be called “anomalies” in the system described in Left of Bang), neurons in the brain fire as signals that something is not right, something not expected has happened, and thus attention is directed toward that stimulus. This, again, may be part of that uncomfortable, unusual sensation that must be explored and entertained rather than rationalized away.

Another issue we must contend with when it comes to awareness is the fact that our ability to exert self-control – such as sustained, focused attention - is a limited resource (as noted in several articles by Baumeister). We cannot indefinitely maintain a high level of vigilance without our attention waning to some degree. Most of us have experienced this phenomenon – we go from listening to a lecture or our significant other to all of a sudden finding ourselves day dreaming and realizing we have missed parts of the presentation (often much to the detriment of grades or relationships). Research has shown that self-control – effortful attention and information processing – functions in a manner similar to our neuromuscular system; just as our muscles use large amounts of energy during exertion and can fatigue quickly, so does and can our ability to sustain mental effort. Also similar to a muscle, there is at least some evidence that we can increase or train this ability to some extent – get better at sustaining attention and concentration for longer periods of time. One way that we can avoid this over-burdening of our attention and self-control capacity is via the successful and appropriate modulation of attention to the situation; this, at least in part, underlies the functional utility of a color code system such as that proposed by Cooper. This system codifies the idea that we need not be in a state of alarm at all times; in fact, we can’t sustain those high levels of arousal and focus for long. Although being in condition white (relaxed and unaware) should be a rarity of us, particularly when outside of areas we control, it is clear that we also cannot maintain orange (on alert to an existing threat stimulus) on a continuous basis and, indeed, our ability to remain in yellow (relaxed but aware) may even be strained over longer periods. Thus part of the lesson here is one we might call “meta-attention” – that is, being aware of our current level of attention and the level called for by the current situation. By “attending to our attention” we can maintain necessary levels while moderating the depletion of this limited but valuable resource.

Thus, two lessons are important; one is to maintain the appropriate level of vigilance for the situation, so as not to consume more resources than are necessary at any one time. This can often be difficult in that we are also naturally inclined to believe that one can never be too cautious or too vigilant. However, to the extent that we know our ability to maintain strict focus will be limited by our available attentional energy, it is important that we use those resources when they are most needed and preserve them when they are not. Part of this distinction is knowing when and where one is and recognizing the differential risk involved. In general, most of us know when the more risky times of day are and where the risks are most critical. As has often been said and was noted earlier, the best defense is “not to be there”. How often do we hear of the “innocent person” (often a male adolescent) who was killed in a dangerous part of town at 2 AM and wonder “What was that person doing there at that time?” We can also moderate this effect by being sure those with us are attending as well; in effect, “covering” for us or “on overwatch”.

The second message we can learn from this need to modulate attention is that we need to ensure down-times, create safe times and zones where those resources can be regenerated, where risk can be more controlled in mechanical ways. This may be easier for the armed civilian than for those who are duty-sworn, but even those whose occupations are defined by risk and states of alarm must find times that the system can wind down and rejuvenate. It is the danger associated with doing double shifts, whether one is a law enforcement officer, a soldier on a perimeter, or an emergency room surgeon; mistakes happen and lives are at risk when attention and concentration are exhausted. Such exposure is also part and parcel of combat stress reactions. As noted above, this can often be done by controlling the environment - identifying safe places (for the civilian, having a safe, secure, well protected home - and, when a safe place is not available, via cooperation among participants; trading off level of vigilance (having “two soldiers per foxhole”). This, of course, requires trust between comrades, a working relationship. One must trust the other members of their team, tribe, community to do their job and each member must know that their comrades’ or principals’ lives are in his hands.

One cannot be distracted from their sector so as to monitor someone else’s.