Study looks at effectiveness of youth searchers in GSAR

[RiverAux]

Here is a link to a newspaper article about an upcoming study about several factors in ground SAR searches, one of which evidentally is a comparison between youth and adult searchers. 

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10249/1085390-455.stm

the study also found a relationship between search effectiveness and the age of the searchers.

Many search-and-rescue efforts include teenage volunteers from Civil Air Patrol squads and Venture Scout crews. Teens appear to have a harder time concentrating for long periods of time and are more likely than adults to miss visual clues, he said.

Search managers can counteract those physiological limitations by keeping younger searchers in the field for shorter periods of time and meeting their physical needs, the study suggests. "They have got to be adequately fed, watered and rested before they are sent out again [to continue a search]," he said.

The actual research article isn't available yet, so your guess is as good as mine as to whether or not the newspaper is accurately reporting things.  I'll reserve judgment until I see the actual article and their statistical analysis. 

[RADIOMAN015]

Here is a link to a newspaper article about an upcoming study about several factors in ground SAR searches, one of which evidentally is a comparison between youth and adult searchers. 

http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/10249/1085390-455.stm

the study also found a relationship between search effectiveness and the age of the searchers.

Many search-and-rescue efforts include teenage volunteers from Civil Air Patrol squads and Venture Scout crews. Teens appear to have a harder time concentrating for long periods of time and are more likely than adults to miss visual clues, he said.

Search managers can counteract those physiological limitations by keeping younger searchers in the field for shorter periods of time and meeting their physical needs, the study suggests. "They have got to be adequately fed, watered and rested before they are sent out again [to continue a search]," he said.

The actual research article isn't available yet, so your guess is as good as mine as to whether or not the newspaper is accurately reporting things.  I'll reserver judgement until I see the actual article and their statistical analysis.

Well my issue with them being the researchers & study authors is that they are members of an established team - how many of their team members are teenagers?   Do they see CAP & Venture crews as competition to their organization?   

Also why don't they actually have some CAP trained teams of teenagers come to that planned exercise/study on 9/11 and than have another group of untrained teenagers & adults and see how well CAP does in comparison (this is really how that study should progress).

HOWEVER, I've got to admit that in my experience, I'm finding that cadets (and I'm not saying ALL) may not have the ability to remain focused to mission requirements for the period of time required even in support roles such as mission radio communications.   Especially if there's multiple comms happening at one time in the mission comm section (we saw this at the NER competition last year with one cadet).   

In one actual UDF mission a few years back (started mid evening to early next morning -- basically all night long e.g. 2000 to 0500 hrs local), the two cadet team members (both who were recent NESA grads) did terrible, it's almost like they had forgotten everything they were trained to do     The next two UDF missions we didn't use cadets at all, only senior members.     

I think that once this study gets published CAP is going to have to take a very hard look at what is reasonable for mostly cadet ground teams to be able to accomplish in real world situations.  Our customers are also going to be concerned about this.  IF someone's life depends upon our performance we do need to be  very certain of what cadets can do effectively, at what callout times & total time in the field
RM

[Eclipse]

I think that once this study gets published CAP is going to have to take a very hard look at what is reasonable for mostly cadet ground teams to be able to accomplish in real world situations.

I think once the study is published CAP isn't going to care that the study was published...

[RADIOMAN015]

I think that once this study gets published CAP is going to have to take a very hard look at what is reasonable for mostly cadet ground teams to be able to accomplish in real world situations.

I think once the study is published CAP isn't going to care that the study was published...

You know with your years of CAP service you may very well be right BUT if you go back to the actual newspaper article referenced above the real experts from the Joint USCG/AF SAR Planning School are going to attend this experiment study on  9/11, so there is some interest by the "professionals" in this study.

Some state SAR plans already place minimum age limits on who can be a volunteer searcher, this might result in more restrictions that could impact Civil Air Patrol's ground teams.  Personally, I don't think CAP is really looking at ground teams as a growth area anyways, since our name is Civil AIR PATROL, which most associate with aircraft s&R anyways :angel:
RM   

[Eclipse]

Personally, I don't think CAP is really looking at ground teams as a growth area anyways, since our name is Civil AIR PATROL, which most associate with aircraft s&R anyways

Its interesting how you can just make something up from nowhere and state it as fact despite the actual reality that Ground DR has been a growing service of CAP in the last several years.

[RiverAux]

I wouldn't be surprised if there were some issues with cadets being kept focused for a day long mission.  Keep in mind that we are basically asking these cadets to put in a full days work in a sometimes tough physical environment.  This is not the norm for most kids 12-18.  Sitting in school for part of a day is a different deal than working what might amount to a 12 hour shift hiking through the woods. 

I expect that these issues would be greater for the younger cadets say 12-15 than the older ones. 

[Майор Хаткевич]

I wouldn't be surprised if there were some issues with cadets being kept focused for a day long mission.  Keep in mind that we are basically asking these cadets to put in a full days work in a sometimes tough physical environment.  This is not the norm for most kids 12-18.  Sitting in school for part of a day is a different deal than working what might amount to a 12 hour shift hiking through the woods. 

I expect that these issues would be greater for the younger cadets say 12-15 than the older ones.

Must have been a long time since you took a math/english/philosophy/chemistry class.

Reading Plato for a few hours makes me want to run around the room more than sitting. School gets so boring, that being out in the woods or doing something of perceived value when you want to do it keep attention for most kids.

[Al Sayre]

So if they exclude all GSAR searchers under 18, what would be the outcome of that?  They would have a whole lot less (semi) trained bodies to do the search.  Better to acknowledge the issue and take actions to correct it.  More frequent breaks, more diligent leaders, more coaching on attention to detail.  Sometimes depending on what you are searching for, all you need is warm bodies - safety in numbers.  It's pretty hard to miss an entire crash site if you are walking a line, or a house if you are doing DR welfare checks.  Man tracking or lost person/survivor searches where clues become important is another story all together. 

[Major Lord]

So one one end of the distribution curve, we find that teenagers often, but not always, have a problem staying focused on the tasks at hand. Shocking news.  ( Please God, tell me the taxpayers did not pay for this "study"!) Have they looked at the other end of the curve, and assessed the effectiveness of elderly SAR folks, who may have wandering minds, less physical stamina, and poorer visual acuity? Its too bad that SAR team members tend to be volunteers instead of perfectly trained and conditioned SAR athletes, who are disposed of once they finish their useful life and who spring into being fully formed without receiving training as teenagers. Sort of a SAR master race, or SAR Marines.

Major Lord

[tsrup]

So one one end of the distribution curve, we find that teenagers often, but not always, have a problem staying focused on the tasks at hand. Shocking news.  ( Please God, tell me the taxpayers did not pay for this "study"!) Have they looked at the other end of the curve, and assessed the effectiveness of elderly SAR folks, who may have wandering minds, less physical stamina, and poorer visual acuity? Its too bad that SAR team members tend to be volunteers instead of perfectly trained and conditioned SAR athletes, who are disposed of once they finish their useful life and who spring into being fully formed without receiving training as teenagers. Sort of a SAR master race, or SAR Marines.

Major Lord

dang, beat me to it.  I agree with this statement 100% ^^^

It also would seem that cadets are more motivated to be a part of a ground team than Seniors are.  The day I see an all senior ground team in our wing I will be astonished. 

Heck the day I see a ground team half comprised of Seniors I will eat my boots.

It may be all fine and dandy, people need to be where they need to be.  But when I see a CUL (or even an MP, MO or a MSA for that mater) complain about the quality of a ground team I start to raise my eyebrows. 

If a cadet is poor at what they do it is a failure on their training.  If you are the CUL and your MRO cadets aren't preforming, you need to fix it.  Just like if I'm the GTL and one of my GTM3 starts wandering around picking at branches. 

And for the record I have seen plenty of instances where the opposite was true, and a cadet was more capable than a senior at doing the job (couple of them being comms btw).

The fact of the matter is that this study isn't going to be even afforded a second glance by our leadership because it would mean crippling our capabilities.  Our youth are not the norm, they are the exception.  And they are the exception for a reason.

[Short Field]

^^^ So because SMs are not perfect or get too old or are ill trained, it invalidates the study?  And you start describing how senior members are not as good as the cadets in order to show how the study was bad? 

All I saw the study say was that teenagers need to be kept hydrated and rested during searches if you want to keep them fully concentrated on the search.  Sounds like common sense to me - and I would not be too excited about it until I actually read how the study was conducted.

[tsrup]

All I saw the study say was that teenagers need to be kept hydrated and rested during searches if you want to keep them fully concentrated on the search. 

And so does anyone else involved with the search.

This study is like saying that there are apples in the produce isle that are red (true) which means that they are the only thing that is red (which is false).  There are green apples and there are red cherries. 

Just like while there are teenagers who can only focus on something for 30 seconds, there are some teenagers that are active and attentive, and then there are seniors who you cant get to focus on something for more than 10 seconds. 

The study seems interesting and valid, but it does nothing to tell us anything that a High School History Teacher (or even a DCC for that matter  ) doesn't already know.

[RiverAux]

Folks don't get too worked up about something that none of us have even seen. 

Lets say that the study proves to a scientific certainity that youth searchers don't do as good a job in some areas.  That doesn't mean the end of cadet GSAR.  At worst it might mean that we look at restricting in-the-woods sortie length for ground teams primarily made up of cadets or more likely incorporating more and longer breaks for cadet ground teams to allow them to get re-energized and refocused.   

Seems like that would be the sort of information we'd want to have so that we could do as good as job as possible with the resources we have available.

[Eclipse]

Gravity is a downer.

Fire is hot.

Teenagers are easily distracted.

Anything else?

[davedove]

It also would seem that cadets are more motivated to be a part of a ground team than Seniors are.  The day I see an all senior ground team in our wing I will be astonished. 

Heck the day I see a ground team half comprised of Seniors I will eat my boots.

Get the steak sauce ready.  Our squadron often fields a team that is more than half senior members.  I will admit though, that is a rarity in CAP.

[Майор Хаткевич]

In Northern IL all SM teams are common. Probably due to cadet limited availability

[ol'fido]

We often try to make generalities out of certain things i.e. teenagers are inattentive, fat people are sloppy, pilots only want to fly, etc. Cadets are individuals just like seniors. Some are going to be fully engaged and some won't be able to find the latrine without supervision. Most however will fall solidly in between and it is up to their leaders to keep them focused. The same thing applies to seniors. Leaders keep on 'em!

[Patterson]

I hate when CAP is referenced, in context with another like organization, but the link or contact info for CAP is not given.  Newspapers are terrible reporting mediums these days.  Most are political pawns owned or funded by one of three major news companies.

As for the research, the group that conducted said research does not have a very high success rate to begin with.  At one point PAWG was going to write up an MOU with them, but they were poorly managed, poorly equipped and lacked skilled members.  In fact, the husband and wife team referenced in the article, makes sooo much money (mostly donations, but some from the State of Pennsylvania as well).

[Ron1319]

Interesting thread.  Since rejoining CAP in California, I find it reassuring to know that someone from another wing is excited about cadet enthusiasm for ES.  I can't say that I see the same here in NorCal, although we're working on changing that.   Having been a GTL and a Observer/Scanner as a cadet, I too find it hard to imagine a mission without cadet involvement, but it's pretty much the norm here.  Changes coming.

[commando1]

 This coming from a cadet take it for what its worth...I have seen much more motivation from the cadets than I ever have from the senior member side...very few senior members undertake GT training when they can train for an aircrew position. In my squadron we have 3 seniors who have dual GT and aircrew qualifications. They are the only ones I have ever met who have that. It is not however, uncommon to have a cadet who is FLM and GTM and possibly MRO or MSA. At my last SAREX we had quite an issue between the distance between "how the crow flies" and "how steep that hill was," becuase the pilots had never had any ground training.