referencebooks (![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} referencebooks) wrote,@ 2005-08-24 09:09:00 |
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| Entry tags: | engineering |
Handbook of Human Factors and Ergonomics
Handbook of Human Factors and Ergonomics, Second Edition
Edited by Gavriel Salvendy.
Published by John Wiley and Sons, Inc., 1997.
This is a chunky hardcover book (red) measuring 6.5" by 9.5" and running 2137 pages in length including the index, plus preferatory material that includes a long table of contents.
Human engineering, or human factors, is an odd field to read about if you're not in engineering. The preface says:
"This handbook is concerned with the role of humans in complex systems, the design of equipment and facilities for human use, and the developments of environments for comfort and safety....
"The field of human factors and ergonomics has developed and broadened considerably since its formal inception more than 50 years ago and has generated a body of knowledge in the following broad areas of specialization:
- The human factors function
- Human factors fundamentals
- Equipment, workplace, and environmental design
- Design for health and safety
- Performance modeling
- Human-computer interface evaluation
- Selected applications of human factors
"The foregoing list shows how broad the field has become. As such, this Handbook should be of value to all human factors and ergonomics specialists, engineers, industrial hygenists, safety engineers, and computer scientists...
"The 4953 manuscript pages of the 60 chapters constituting the second edition of the Handbook were written by 112 people. In creating this Handbook, the authors gathered information from 5577 references and presented 264 tables and 599 figures to provide theoretically based and practically oriented material for use by both practitioners and researchers."
The 60 chapters of the book are in nine sections:
- The Human Factors Function
- The Human Factors Fundamentals
- Job Design
- Equipment, Workplace, and Environmental Design
- Design for Health and Safety
- Performance Modeling
- Evaluation
- Human-Computer Interaction
- Selected Applications of Human Factors
For a sample of what's in here, I'll open the book three times at random and describe what I find... First time, I'm in the middle of a long bibliography at the end of the section, "Design for Macrogravity and Microgravity Environments." Second time, I'm in a section called "Virtual Environments," looking at subsections on "Language Instruction" and "Driving and Flight Training." In the section on language instruction virtual environments we read, "Using VE-technology, whether delays in cognitive development could be counteracted by initiating intensive human experiences within a virtual environment was investigated. The VE system setup, which was used to complement the existing educational methods and principles, offered large communicative and kinesthetic potential for students with speech impediments or physical disabilities." ...Third time, I'm in the broad section called "Job Design," in the subsection, "Task Analysis." The subsection with the heading "Psychical Perspectives" begins, "When studying how task parameters affect the human organism, it is of particular importance how information processing takes place: But the perspective will be restricted to the 'cost of information processing' and its implications to task analysis."
Reading about human factors can be spooky, because it's premised on the treatment of people (always called "humans" in the field) as means rather than as ends, and because it is literally a science of more smoothly and effectively incorporating people into engineered systems. This book, containing a summary of significant research findings in this vast field of study, is useful to people whose work involves doing this, and enlightening for others who would like to be aware of the contemporary science behind turning people into cogs in the machine.
