Designing Backup-Supporting Information Displays for Multi-Human Multi-Agent Teams in Drone Swarm Supervision

Search-and-rescue (SAR) drone swarms increasingly require multi-operator supervision, in which backup behaviors redistribute cognitive load to improve performance but introduce trade-offs in situational awareness (SA) and task engagement. Existing human-autonomy teaming interfaces present symmetric displays across all roles, ignoring the asymmetric information needs of backup providers and recipients. We developed a two-human, eight-drone Unity SAR testbed that operationalizes three team structures (independent, Operator A-busy, Operator B-busy) via event-allocation manipulation, with a SPAM (Situation Present Assessment Method)-derived in-task SA probe. Three iterative focus groups with eight human-centered design researchers and professionals yielded four display conditions: no-display baseline, effort display, urgency display, and combined. Semi-structured interviews with three SAR practitioners confirmed high realism ratings for the overall testbed and the viability of dynamic backup. A feasibility pilot study ( N = 4) revealed a significant main effect of team structure on backup count, confirming that the manipulation elicits backup behaviors as designed.