Soldiers, Simulators, and Symmetry: Zeroing in to improve communication with Army training key influencers

This study examined the perceptions and attitudes of the Army’s Senior Non-Commissioned Officers regarding the Army’s training simulators from a communication perspective. It recognizes an understudied population of Army soldiers, Senior NCOs, especially at the Command Sergeant Major level, as key influencers when it involves what tools get used by soldiers for training. Leveraging Grunig’s two-way symmetrical communication and the Diffusion of Innovations theory as the basis for this study, Command Sergeant Majors at the Division and Brigade organizational levels from across the Army participated in interviews, providing their insights for this qualitative study to answer the overarching research question: How can the Army improve communication between the capability developer community and training key influencers, the Army’s Senior NCO community? The results of this study provide valuable insight into how these key influencers view Army training simulators, how the key influencers are currently receiving information, how they prefer to receive information, what types of information they want to receive, and who they want to receive that information from. Additional insight is provided on how to improve communication between them and the capability development community and the key influencer’s desire to be more involved in the training simulator development process. Recommendations are made based on the study’s data and practical application of Grunig’s two-way symmetrical communication and the Diffusion of Innovations theories.

Grantor dc:publisher

University of Kansas

Year dc:date.issued

2024

Author dc:creator

• Burns, Evelyn Aretta

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Belmas, Genelle

• Journalism
• Mass communication
• Army
• Communication
• Diffusion of Innovations
• Simulators
• Two-Way Symmetrical Communication

Statement dc:rights

• This item is protected by copyright and unless otherwise specified the copyright of this thesis/dissertation is held by the author.

Language dc:language.iso

en

Dc Identifier Other

https://www.proquest.com/LegacyDocView/DISSNUM/31765174

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:kuscholarworks.ku.edu:1808/36376