Human Factors Minute

Addressing climate change, and sustainability efforts requires us to change our beliefs, assumptions, and thinking about the environment, our economies, and our well being. In order to change these, we must be aware of many common oversights when considering sustainable thinking. Most people look for evidence that confirms existing beliefs and tend to reject contradictory information, resulting in...

Many plastics are used for single-use disposable applications, such as packaging, agricultural films and disposable consumer items, and is the main source of waste plastics. Human factors plays a key role when considering the materials and design features of these plastics and can help manufacturers achieve functional yet reusable product designs.  However, In many cases, reusable device manu...

Ensuring trash and recycling makes it into proper receptacles is important because it prevents pollution, reduces the need to harvest new raw materials, and is critical for reducing runoff of materials into the ocean Human factors plays a key role when considering the design of these recepticles and their environment to encourage adoption Some ways in which Human Factors can encourage people to ut...

Oil spills happen in rivers, bays and the ocean and are most often caused by accidents involving tankers, barges and oil rigs, among other facilities . But a common cause across all of these oil spills is people making mistakes In the oil and gas industry, Human Factors is an essential component in the effort to operate in a safe and efficient manner to prevent oil spillage. Some areas in which Hu...

Safety is a large concern in waste collection as it has a higher than average fatal injury rate when compared to industry. Waste collection work is associated with a variety of physical, chemical, and biological hazards.  Some studies and reports suggest that fatal injuries when exposed to these hazards are more than doubling when considering door-to-door waste collection occupations.  W...

The Chartered Institute of Ergonomics and Human Factors have released a document Defining climate ergonomics Climate ergonomics is a scientific discipline that focuses on human interactions, and their effect on the macro-climate that they inhabit. Climate ergonomics applies theory, data, and methods to optimize both human and climate well-being and operates within three main areas: Cognitive, whic...

Human Factors Cast has partnered with a ton of other content creators for #TeamSeas! The goal is to get 30 million pounds of trash out of the ocean.  By partnering with non-profit cleanup organizations all over the world, for every dollar this makes, there will be one less pound of trash in the ocean, beaches, and rivers.  From trash-eating robots that sit on the river, to beach cleanup...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! The Clinical Human Factors Group is a charity that works with healthcare professionals, managers and service-users partnering with experts in Human Factors from healthcare and other industries to campaign for change in the National health service and healthcare. Their vision is of a healthcare system that places an understanding of Human Factors at the...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! Did you know that the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society has 24 technical groups that are concerned with the human factors aspects of specific application areas? One of those is The Cognitive Engineering and Decision Making Technical Group This Technical Group is focused on the study and applicatoin of human decision making and cognition to the design...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! Think aloud protocol: Also known as "concurrent verbal protocol", is the process of asking a user to execute a series of tasks or use technology, while continuously verbalizing their thoughts so that a researcher can gain insights into the users' analytical process. This method can be useful for identifying design flaws that do not affect task performan...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! Did you know that the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society has 24 technical groups that are concerned with the human factors aspects of specific application areas? One of those is the USABILITY AND SYSTEM EVALUATION TECHNICAL GROUP which changed their name from Test and Evaluation Technical group in April, 2019. which focuses on the quantitative and qua...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! The Chartered Institute of Ergonomics and Human Factors is a professional member organisation for ergonomists and human factors specialists. This organization accredits education and training courses and recognises quality ergonomics services. Their activities raise awareness about the broad scope and positive impact of the discipline in all aspects of...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! The outbreak of World War II, witnessed the tipping point where the technological advances had finally outpaced the ability of people to adapt and compensate to poor designs. This was most evident in airplane crashes by highly-trained pilots due to problems with control configurations. The two decades following the end of World War II saw the continuati...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! In the United States, the discipline of human factors and ergonomics, is generally considered to have originated during World War II, although advances that contributed to its formation can be traced to the turn of the 20th century. Prior to World War II, the focus was “designing the human to fit the machine” (i.e., trial and error), instead of designin...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! Some have stated that human ergonomics began with Australopithecus prometheus (also known as “little foot”), a primate who created handheld tools out of different types of stone, clearly distinguishing between tools based on their ability to perform designated tasks. The foundations of the science of ergonomics appear to have been laid within the contex...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! The Human Factors and Ergonomics Society is an international, multidisciplinary, nonprofit organization of close to 5,000 members involved in the human factors field. As the largest organization of human factors professionals in the world, HFES members are concerned with the safety, usability, and maintainability of systems and products that involve the...

...and now for another Human Factors Minute! The International Symposium on Human Factors and Ergonomics in Health Care offers cutting-edge presentations, posters, and workshops on emerging issues in health care human factors and the challenges facing the industry in the near future. The Health Care Symposium covers human factors and ergonomics applied to health care devices, environments, and end...

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