In recent years, new types of interactive analytical dashboard features have emerged for operational decision support systems (DSS). Analytical components of such features solve optimization problems hidden from the human eye, whereas interactive components involve the individual in the optimization process via graphical user interfaces (GUIs). Despite their expected value for organizations, little is known about the effectiveness of interactive analytical dashboards in operational DSS or their influences on human cognitive abilities. This paper contributes to the closing of this gap by exploring and empirically testing the effects of interactive analytical dashboard features on situation awareness (SA) and task performance in operational DSS. Using the theoretical lens of SA, we develop hypotheses about the effects of a what-if analysis as an interactive analytical dashboard feature on operational decision-makers' SA and task performance. The resulting research model is studied with a laboratory experiment, including eye-tracking data of 83 participants. Our findings show that although a what-if analysis leads to higher task performance, it may also reduce SA, nourishing a potential out-of-the-loop problem. Thus, designers and users of interactive analytical dashboards have to carefully mitigate these effects in the implementation and application of operational DSS. In this article, we translate our findings into implications for designing dashboards within operational DSS to help practitioners in their efforts to address the danger of the out-of-the-loop syndrome.

近年来，针对运营决策支持系统 (DSS) 出现了新型交互式分析仪表板功能。这些功能的分析组件解决了人眼看不见的优化问题，而交互式组件则通过图形用户界面（GUI）让个人参与优化过程。尽管交互式分析仪表板对组织具有预期价值，但人们对运营 DSS 中交互式分析仪表板的有效性或其对人类认知能力的影响知之甚少。本文通过探索和实证测试交互式分析仪表板功能对运营 DSS 中的态势感知 (SA) 和任务绩效的影响，有助于缩小这一差距。利用 SA 的理论视角，我们提出假设分析作为交互式分析仪表板功能对运营决策者的 SA 和任务绩效的影响的假设。由此产生的研究模型是通过实验室实验进行研究的，其中包括 83 名参与者的眼动追踪数据。我们的研究结果表明，尽管假设分析可以带来更高的任务绩效，但它也可能会降低 SA，从而引发潜在的循环外问题。因此，交互式分析仪表板的设计者和用户必须在运营 DSS 的实施和应用中仔细减轻这些影响。在本文中，我们将我们的发现转化为在运营 DSS 中设计仪表板的启示，以帮助从业者努力解决脱环综合症的危险。