A strategy for human factors/ergonomics: developing the discipline and profession

Human factors/ergonomics (HFE) has great potential to contribute to the design of all kinds of systems with people (work systems, product/service systems), but faces challenges in the readiness of its market and in the supply of high-quality applications. HFE has a unique combination of three fundamental characteristics: (1) it takes a systems approach (2) it is design driven and (3) it focuses on two closely related outcomes: performance and well-being. In order to contribute to future system design, HFE must demonstrate its value more successfully to the main stakeholders of system design. HFE already has a strong value proposition (mainly well-being) and interactivity with the stakeholder group of 'system actors' (employees and product/service users). However, the value proposition (mainly performance) and relationships with the stakeholder groups of 'system experts' (experts fromtechnical and social sciences involved in system design), and 'system decision makers' (managers and other decision makers involved in system design, purchase, implementation and use), who have a strong power to influence system design, need to be developed. Therefore, the first main strategic direction is to strengthen the demand for high-quality HFE by increasing awareness among powerful stakeholders of the value of high-quality HFE by communicating with stakeholders, by building partnerships and by educating stakeholders. The second main strategic direction is to strengthen the application of high-quality HFE by promoting the education of HFE specialists, by ensuring high-quality standards of HFE applications and HFE specialists, and by promoting HFE research excellence at universities and other organisations. This strategy requires cooperation between the HFE community at large, consisting of the International Ergonomics Association (IEA), local (national and regional) HFE societies, and HFE specialists. We propose a joint world-wide HFE development plan, in which the IEA takes a leadership role. PRACTITIONER SUMMARY: Human factors/ergonomics (HFE) has much to offer by addressing major business and societal challenges regarding work and product/service systems. HFE potential, however, is underexploited. This paper presents a strategy for the HFE community to strengthen demand and application of high-quality HFE, emphasising its key elements: systems approach, design driven, and performance and well-being goals.     

Improving digital human modelling for proactive ergonomics in design

This paper presents the need to improve existing digital human models (DHMs) so they are better able to serve as effective ergonomics analysis and design tools. Existing DHMs are meant to be used by a designer early in a product development process when attempting to improve the physical design of vehicle interiors and manufacturing workplaces. The emphasis in this paper is placed on developing future DHMs that include valid posture and motion prediction models for various populations. It is argued that existing posture and motion prediction models now used in DHMs must be changed to become based on real motion data to assure validity for complex dynamic task simulations. It is further speculated that if valid human posture and motion prediction models are developed and used, these can be combined with psychophysical and biomechanical models to provide a much greater understanding of dynamic human performance and population specific limitations and that these new DHM models will ultimately provide a powerful ergonomics design tool.     

Fundamentals of systems ergonomics/human factors

Ergonomics/human factors is, above anything else, a systems discipline and profession, applying a systems philosophy and systems approaches. Many things are labelled as system in today's world, and this paper specifies just what attributes and notions define ergonomics/human factors in systems terms. These are obviously a systems focus, but also concern for context, acknowledgement of interactions and complexity, a holistic approach, recognition of emergence and embedding of the professional effort involved within organization system. These six notions are illustrated with examples from a large body of work on rail human factors.     

Adding a strategic edge to human factors/ergonomics: Principles for the management of uncertainty as cornerstones for system design

It is frequently lamented that human factors and ergonomics knowledge does not receive the attention and consideration that it deserves. In this paper I argue that in order to change this situation human factors/ergonomics based system design needs to be positioned as a strategic task within a conceptual framework that incorporates both business and design concerns. The management of uncertainty is presented as a viable candidate for such a framework. A case is described where human factors/ergonomics experts in a railway company have used the management of uncertainty perspective to address strategic concerns at firm level. Furthermore, system design is discussed in view of the relationship between organization and technology more broadly. System designers need to be supported in better understanding this relationship in order to cope with the uncertainties this relationship brings to the design process itself. Finally, the emphasis on uncertainty embedded in the recent surge of introducing risk management across all business sectors is suggested as another opportunity for bringing human factors and ergonomics expertise to the fore.     

Axiomatic design principles in analysing the ergonomics design parameter of a virtual environment

One of the negative side effects experienced by users when interacting with virtual environment is visual symptoms. This paper explores the ergonomics design parameters of the virtual environment to minimize such negative side effect by applying axiomatic design principles. Axiomatic design is a method to provide a systematic way for designing products and large systems. The independence axiom is used to map customer domain (CAs) to functional domain (FRs) and physical domain (DPs). A paper based survey was conducted to identify and define customers' preference in the virtual environment. A virtual robot manufacturing system was developed as a case study to explore ergonomic design parameters that satisfy the independence of FRs and CAs. Results of this study shows that the ergonomic design parameters of virtual environment identified (DP₁₆₁-DP₁₆₂-DP₁₂₁-DP₁₁₁-DP₁₃₁-DP₁₄₁-DP₁₅₁-DP₁₅₂) have satisfied the independence functional requirement and desired visual comfort for users. By uncoupling the design it provides an efficient and effective sequence of design activities FR₁₆₁-FR₁₆₂-FR₁₂₁-FR₁₁₁-FR₁₃₁-FR₁₄₁-FR₁₅₁-FR₁₅₂.     

High-level operations dedicated to the integration of mechanical analysis within a design process

Here we present the high-level operators of the Mechanical Analysis Module, which is a software architecture dedicated to a better integration of the structural analysis phase within an integrated Computer-Aided Design environment. This generic module is independent of the mechanical analysis method used, and takes place in a distributed software architecture of an integrated design environment. The paper shows that the mechanical operators defined are split among geometric and mechanical treatments in order to enforce this distributed architecture. Thus, the interface between the geometric treatments and the mechanical analysis environment shows the adequacy of the boolean operators when used with mechanical analysis treatments. However, this is demonstrated for a restricted domain of the mechanical analysis, and open ended questions still exist as to when the geometry of the models is diversified. Also, requirements for new geometric treatments and extensions of the current geometric representation are listed.     

QFD: a methodological tool for integration of ergonomics at the design stage

As a marked increase in the number of musculoskeletal disorders was noted in many industrialized countries and more specifically in companies that require the use of hand tools, the French National Research and Safety Institute launched in 1999 a research program on the topic of integrating ergonomics into hand tool design. After a brief review of the problems of integrating ergonomics at the design stage, the paper shows how the "Quality Function Deployment" method has been applied to the design of a boning knife and it highlights the difficulties encountered. Then, it demonstrates how this method can be a methodological tool geared to greater ergonomics consideration in product design.     

The development of human factors design guidelines

There is a growing information gap between the development of advanced human-machine systems, and the availability of human factors design criteria that can be applied during their design process. Despite increased interest in the development of human factors design guidelines, there also remains considerable uncertainty and concern regarding the actual utility of such information. Indeed, many existing human factors reference materials have been criticized by designers for being ‘too wordy’, ‘too general’, and ‘too hard to understand’. The development of clear, relevant, and useful human factors guidelines requires a judicious mix of science and art to overcome such criticisms. Specifically, while a number of empirical and systematic methods can be productively applied to their development, the final design guidelines will always represent a subjective integration of user requirements, design constraints, available information, and expert judgement. This paper summarizes procedures and heuristics associated with both the science and the art components of human factors design guideline development.     

Questioning validity in the area of ergonomics/human factors

This paper focuses on the analysis of deviation in findings within ergonomics/human factors (E/HF) research. The current terms used to address the analysis of deviation in empirical research revolve around the notion of validity. In E/HF research papers, 'validity' is widely interpreted and includes its common parlance usage. More importantly, analysis frequently limits 'validation' to the equivalent of 'verification', eventually resulting in 'validity' as a label of little significance. To clarify the analysis of deviation, 'investigative syntaxes' are introduced to show what exactly should or can be questioned when deviation is observed, i.e. either empirical findings or propositions, and how this questioning can be structured. The possibility is discussed that, with or without the help of these syntaxes, validation may become a method of inquiry; a productive means of generating significant theoretical questions which bear directly on empirical work.     

Questioning validity in the area of ergonomics/human factors

This paper focuses on the analysis of deviation in findings within ergonomics/human factors (E/HF) research. The current terms used to address the analysis of deviation in empirical research revolve around the notion of validity. In E/HF research papers, ‘validity’ is widely interpreted and includes its common parlance usage. More importantly, analysis frequently limits ‘validation’ to the equivalent of ‘verification’, eventually resulting in ‘validity’ as a label of little significance. To clarify the analysis of deviation, ‘investigative syntaxes’ are introduced to show what exactly should or can be questioned when deviation is observed, i.e. either empirical findings or propositions, and how this questioning can be structured. The possibility is discussed that, with or without the help of these syntaxes, validation may become a method of inquiry; a productive means of generating significant theoretical questions which bear directly on empirical work.     

An ergonomics action research demonstration: integrating human factors into assembly design processes

In action research (AR), the researcher participates ‘in’ the actions in an organisation, while simultaneously reflecting ‘on’ the actions to promote learning for both the organisation and the researchers. This paper demonstrates a longitudinal AR collaboration with an electronics manufacturing firm where the goal was to improve the organisation's ability to integrate human factors (HF) proactively into their design processes. During the three-year collaboration, all meetings, workshops, interviews and reflections were digitally recorded and qualitatively analysed to inform new ‘actions’. By the end of the collaboration, HF tools with targets and sign-off by the HF specialist were integrated into several stages of the design process, and engineers were held accountable for meeting the HF targets. We conclude that the AR approach combined with targeting multiple initiatives at different stages of the design process helped the organisation find ways to integrate HF into their processes in a sustainable way.

Practitioner Summary: Researchers acted as a catalyst to help integrate HF into the engineering design process in a sustainable way. This paper demonstrates how an AR approach can help achieve HF integration, the benefits of using a reflective stance and one method for reporting an AR study.     

Operational definitions for system requirements as the basis of design automation

This paper introduces formal definitions to system requirements as the basis of design automation. Semi-formal requirements for real-time systems are expressed in the form of system verification diagrams, and the graph model of behaviour represents the design, capturing three aspects of system behaviour—control, data and interpretation. The design model is considered operational as an underlying token machine governs its actual behaviour. To achieve automatic design synthesis, the semantics of each construct in the requirement model have to be formally defined. These definitions constitute the core of a knowledge base in an automatic design synthesis tool.     

Developing information appliance design tools for designers

As more products become computer-embedded, designers need to consider both the hardware and interface. Traditional design processes and design tools focus on hardware aspects, and so new methods and techniques must be investigated and developed. The aim of this study is to investigate new design models for designing computer-embedded products. In particular, it focuses on ways by which designers can be assisted in problem identification, exploration and evaluation of design solutions by using a rapid interface prototyping technique. The technique is based on a widely used general presentation software application. It can be used to develop fully functional prototypes of computer embedded products without electronic engineering skills.     

The contributions of human factors and ergonomics to a sustainable minerals industry

This article describes examples of the application of human factors research and development work to a sustainable minerals industry. It begins by outlining human-related aspects of the minerals industry and the key human factors work previously undertaken in this domain. The focus then switches to sustainability in the minerals industry. Sustainability principles are introduced and illustrations provided of how human factors research and development work fits within such a framework. Three case studies of human factors in the minerals industry research are presented and the sustainability implications in each case study are highlighted. Finally, future trends related to human factors work in a sustainable minerals industry are addressed, in particular the opportunities and possible adverse consequences that increasing deployment of mining automation might bring.

Practitioner Summary: Minerals industries are a major global activity with significant sustainability implications. Aspects of sustainability in mining are examined using three case studies. These illustrate the contribution of human factors/ergonomics in reducing risks; developing emergency response management systems; and the value of participatory ergonomics in improving the design of mining equipment.     

Revolutions and shifting paradigms in human factors & ergonomics

The "Revolution in Information Technology" has spawned a series of transformational revolutions in the nature and practice of human factors and ergonomics (HFE). "Generation 1" HFE evolved with a focus on adapting equipment, workplace and tasks to human capabilities and limitations. Generation 2, focused on cognitive systems integration, arose in response to the need to manage automation and dynamic function allocation. Generation 3 is focused on symbiotic technologies that can amplify human physical and cognitive capabilities. Generation 4 is emergent and is focused on biological enhancement of physical or cognitive capabilities. The shift from HFE Generations 1 and 2 to Generations 3 and 4 profoundly alters accepted boundary constraints on the adaptability of humans in complex systems design. Furthermore, it has opened an ethical divide between those that see cognitive and physical enhancement as a great benefit to society and those who perceive this as tampering with the fundamentals of human nature.     

New methodological framework to improve productivity and ergonomics in assembly system design

This work analyses how ergonomics and assembly system design techniques are intimately related. It also develops a new theoretical framework to assess a concurrent engineering approach to assembly systems design problems, in conjunction with an ergonomics optimization of the workplace. Its purpose is to provide professionals with a new and detailed approach to assembly system design procedures that includes ergonomics issues.The methodological framework offered takes into account technological variables (related to work times and methods), environmental variables (i.e. absenteeism, staff turnover, work force motivation) and ergonomics evaluations (i.e. human diversity) to create a comprehensive analysis.At conclusion of the study, the work reports data and insights from two real industrial cases, where an advanced simulation software is used, to validate the procedure and support methodology applicability.

Relevance to industries

This work provides an extremely valuable methodological framework to companies who recognize the link between assembly and ergonomics. The methodology underlines the necessity to analyze and classify the assembly system layout configuration in relation to both technological and environmental parameters- as reported in the framework.