Topic 4 - Ergonomics (Human Factors) Flashcards
What study did Brown and Baulton conduct in 1961?
Participants drove in either a residential area or a crowded shopping centre car park while listening to a tape of numbers
What were the two driving environments used in the Brown and Baulton study?
- Residential area - few inputs
- Crowded shopping centre car park - large numver of important inouts
In which driving environment did participants make more errors?
Shopping centre car park
What task were participants required to perform while driving?
Identify changed numbers from a sequence
What conclusion can be drawn about attention from the study?
Participants needed to give more attention to driving, leaving less mental capacity for the number task
Brown and Baulton’s study exemplifies which concept?
Secondary task performance
Fill in the blank: Participants made more errors in the _______ than in the residential area.
shopping centre car park
What was the method of Brown and Baulton’s study?
Participants drove in either:
A residential area - few important inputs
A car park of a crowded shopping centre - large number of important inputs
While doing this they were played a tape containing lists of numbers
They had to identify what numbers changed from one sequence to the next
What were the results of Brown and Baulton’s study?
Participants made more errors in the shopping centre car park than the residential area
Participants needed to give more attention to the stimuli associated with their primary task of driving so had less mental capacity left over for the stimuli associated with the less important number task
This is an example of secondary task performance
What was the Hawthorne studies?
Study carried out in the Hawthorne plane in Chicago in the 1920s
Mayo was investigating effects of the physical environment on productivity levels
Initially they varied light levels for the experimental group and kept the same level for the control group and found that both improved in terms of productivity
Level of light didn’t matter - bright or dull experimental group improved
All changes they made caused an increase in productivity
Explain the conclusions of the Hawthorne studies:
Popular interpretation is that it was the novelty of the situation and fhe fact that the workers knew they were being observed that caused the increase in production
This became known as “The Hawthorne Effect”
Humans performance improves when they know they are being observed
What was the method of Stones study:
Stone studied whether ability to study is affected by:
The setting - open plan or private
Colour of the room - blue white or red
Type of task - reading or maths
144 students assigned to 1 of 12 condition from the combination of colour, setting and task
They were asked to complete a questionnaire that measured mood, satisfaction and motivation
What were the findings of Stones study in an open plan room?
Most positive mood in the blue open plan room
Least positive mood in the red open plan room
Most satisfaction with performance in blue open plan room
What were the findings of Stones study in a private room?
Red brought the most positive mood in private room
Most satisfaction with performance in white private room
What were the overall findings in Stones study?
Little difference in privacy between open plan and private room
Participants performed worse in reading task irrespective of setting if in a red room but better if in a white room
