United States Department of Energy Physical Standards Validation Study

Physical Security - The Human Element, September 30, 1982

On August 8, 1980, the DOE let a contract, "for the professional development and validation of a battery of physical fitness measures and standards" for its Security Inspectors (currently known as Security Police Officers).  The problem to be solved was, to identify and develop a "criterion-related" and "easily and economically administered set of physical fitness measures and standards" for the Security Inspectors.

The review team visited DOE Headquarters, Albuquerque, Chicago, Idaho, Nevada, Oak Ridge, Richland, San Francisco, Savannah River, and Naval Reactors sites to identify a common set of tasks for security inspectors to include routine (day-to-day activities) and armed, combative tasks ("that would only take place in training or in the event of an actual hostile act").  They quickly determined and validated with the sites that the most physically demanding tasks would be those of an armed, combative nature and developed five criterion trials:  offensive combative, defensive combative, hostile building search, response to containment, and response to alarm scenario.  Their subjects would be graded according to:  mission accomplishment, adversaries neutralized, whether or not the subject was neutralized, (when appropriate) the hostage was killed, and (when appropriate) the elapsed time of the test.

They also developed a provisional physical fitness battery consisting of:  one mile run, half mile run, 40 yard dash (from prone), 80 yard shuttle run, and 40 yard agility run.  They then ran all 71 of their subjects through the physical fitness battery under the supervision of a physician.  They then began running the criterion trials.  Two of their subjects were unable to complete the entire battery due to minor injuries.  The study noted that, "as with any criterion-related validation strategy, the most difficult part of this study was the development of appropriate criteria."  Task simulations were approved by representatives from the nuclear security field.  Additionally, detailed critique sheets were provided to the subjects with the following results.  "Participant comments were overwhelmingly supportive of the realism, applicability, objectivity and overall fairness of evaluation of all simulations."

Analysis of the data indicated strong correlation between the mile run/40 yard dash combination and mission accomplishment for the offensive criterion trials.  The report stated, "These results indicate that the best single predictor for Offensive Combatants is the 1-mile run and the best combination (Note: best of the combinations offered by the provisional fitness battery) is the 1-mile run and the 40 yard dash.  For Defensive Combatants and other simulations, the best single predictor is the ½-mile run and best combination of predicators is the ½ mile run and the 40 yard dash."  Given that incumbents were involved, the data was then examined to determine the "cut point" time where all subjects who could perform on the job could meet the time requirements for the run and the dash.  The data was then examined to identify the cross point time where the minimum number of subjects passed the physical test but could not perform the job.  The resulting times were used to establish the 10 CFR 1046 standards we have today of 8:30/run and 8.0/dash for Offensive Combatants and 4:40/run and 8.5/dash for Defensive Combatants.