{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,8,12]],"date-time":"2026-08-12T15:19:56Z","timestamp":1786547996743,"version":"3.56.0"},"reference-count":39,"publisher":"SAGE Publications","issue":"1","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[1995,3,1]],"date-time":"1995-03-01T00:00:00Z","timestamp":794016000000},"content-version":"tdm","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/journals.sagepub.com\/page\/policies\/text-and-data-mining-license"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Hum Factors"],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[1995,3]]},"abstract":"<jats:p>Situation awareness (SA) is a relatively new concept that has captured the imagination of the human factors community. This new concept is considered in the light of Benton J. Underwood's discussion about psychological concepts. In particular the distinction between SA as a phenomenon description (Level 2 concept) and SA as a causal agent (Level 3 concept) is discussed. The argument that SA is valuable as a phenomenon description draws attention to the intimate interactions between human and environment in determining meaning (or what matters) and reflects an increased appreciation for the intimate coupling between processing stages (e.g., perception, decision, and action) within closed-loop systems. However, I caution against considering SA as a causal agent. When SA is considered to be an object within the cognitive agent, there is a danger of circular reasoning in which SA is presented as the cause of itself. As a causal explanation, SA is a simple, easy-to-understand wrong answer that, in the end, will be an obstacle to research. As a phenomenon description, SA invites further research to discover causal relationships between the design of human-machine systems and the resulting performance.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.1518\/001872095779049480","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2006,12,3]],"date-time":"2006-12-03T17:51:27Z","timestamp":1165168287000},"page":"149-157","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":129,"title":["Situation Awareness: Proceed with Caution"],"prefix":"10.1177","volume":"37","author":[{"given":"John M.","family":"Flach","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Wright State University, Dayton, Ohio"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"179","published-online":{"date-parts":[[1995,3,1]]},"reference":[{"key":"atypb1","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1177\/001872089203400502"},{"key":"atypb2","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Blanchard, R. E. (1993). Situation awareness-Transition from theory to practice. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 37th Annual Meeting (pp. 39\u201342). Santa Monica, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society.","DOI":"10.1177\/154193129303700110"},{"key":"atypb3","volume-title":"The conceptual framework of psychology.","author":"Brunswik, E.","year":"1952"},{"key":"atypb4","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Endsley, M. R. (1988). Design and evaluation for situation awareness. In Proceedings of the Human Factors Society 32nd Annual Meeting (pp. 97\u2013101). Santa Monica, CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society.","DOI":"10.1177\/154193128803200221"},{"key":"atypb5","unstructured":"Endsley, M. R. (1993). Situation awareness: The development and application of a theoretical framework. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 37th Annual Meeting (pp. 39\u201340). Santa Monica. CA: Human Factors and Ergonomics Society."},{"key":"atypb6","first-page":"315","volume-title":"Situational awareness in complex systems","author":"Endsley, M. R.","year":"1994"},{"key":"atypb7","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1207\/s15326969eco0202_1"},{"key":"atypb8","doi-asserted-by":"publisher","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-642-78119-3_43"},{"key":"atypb9","unstructured":"Flach, J. M. (1994a). Beyond the servomechanism: Implications of closed-loop, adaptive couplings for modeling human-machine systems. In Proceedings of the '94 Symposium on Human Interaction with Complex Systems (pp. 401\u2013406). Greensboro: North Carolina A&T State University."},{"key":"atypb10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Flach, J. M. (1994b). Ruminations on mind, matter, and what matters. In Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society 38th Annual Meeting (pp. 531\u2013535). 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