Developing a Simulation to Examine the Will to Fight
and Sacrifice ; Does Fidelity Matter?
Aubrie Kuhrt, Alexa Quilliam, Nicole Williams, CDR Kenneth King, Lt Col Chad Tossell
Warfighter Effectiveness Research Center (Dept of Behavioral Sciences, USAFA)
Problem
The will to fight has been identified as the most important factor
towards successful war outcomes; however, measuring the will to
fight is subjective and has not been explored fully
-- Solution: Lower an individual's decision-action gap through
survey, Xbox, and VR scenarios
Approach
Detailed analysis of alternatives to examine current and future
ways to predict the will to fight in a game
-- Evaluate Commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) solutions
Once selected, examine behaviors in gaming environment as a
proxy towards understanding an individual's will to fight with
diverse backgrounds
Design a proof of concept for USAFA to continue advancing the
ways we assess warrior ethos
Early Design Ideas / Prototyping
-- Survey #1: Pre-survey that gives participants a series of questions
based on the upcoming scenario
-- Survey #2: Post Xbox survey that compares answers from the
initial survey
-- Survey #3: Post VR survey that compares participant's answers
from the previous surveys
-- Survey #4: Post-survey that allows participants to reflect on if
their decisions changed over the course of each scenario
Status / Way Ahead
The goal moving forward is to gather and analyze data to further
bolster our hypothesis.
Distribution A. Approved for Public Release
