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Understanding the Human Mind
Conceptual Understanding: Human beings vary psychologically in complex ways. Any attempt by designers to classify people into groups merely results in a statement of broad principles that may or may not be relevant to the individual. Design permeates every aspect of human experience and data pertaining to what cannot be seen such as touch, taste, and smell are often expressions of opinion rather than checkable fact.
Psychology is a science; therefore, it relies upon scientific research to study behavior and mental processes. Research in psychology is based on the scientific method and involves: conceptualizing a problem, collecting data, analyzing the data and drawing conclusions.
Psychological factor data: Human factor data related to psychological interpretations caused by light, smell, sound, taste, temperature and texture.
Smell: An response to an environment, being one of the most powerful senses a human possesses. Smell is important in food, perfumes, candles, deodorants, chemicals. Unpleasant odors are added to chemicals to warn people.
Taste: Important for young children’s products who explore their world with their mouths. Toxins are an issue
Taste is important in food, it must have a good taste to sell well. Responses to taste are also a factor of culture and experience.
Light: provides ease of visibility making reading text easier whether ambient, directed or on screens. The level of illumination should increase as the tasks becomes more precise; for example the illumination required for a surgeon is brighter than the illumination needed for a corridor. Lighting in workplaces, safety. For example effects of fluorescent lighting and rotating parts on machinery. Lighting effect on ambience and mood, e.g. lighting in restaurants – gentle, calming, stimulating.
Texture: provides valuable feedback, and information related to touch & grip. Shapes and textures improve products and make them easier to use, for example bottle tops, handles fabrics and non-slip floors, smooth worktops in kitchen.
Noise: Being able to hear sound adequately so users can receive feedback from the product.
Sound: can be used to:
Provide information such as a warning signal (fire alarm or alarm).
Sound for reassurance that the product is working ex. Watches
Feedback , whistling kettles, reversing trucks
Sound can be positive in the environment such as playing music in an exhibition. Noise can also be negative in a workspace, that’s why open plan offices use screens to reduce noise.
Temperature: Hot or cold conditions affect humans productively.
Clothing is an important part of a comfortable work environment but the environment must be controlled regardless of the outside climate. How the user responds to different environmental factors, for example, how warm or cold work environments can affect the performance of an individual. A range of comfort zones will exist based on body mass, manner of dress or even physiological changes that can be developed from exposure to a particular temperature or environment over time.
Designers need to use a variety of methods of collecting and representing psychological data.
Surveys or questionnaires. These require subjects to read questions and mark their answers. Some psychologists observe behaviour and mental processes by administering standardized tests.
Interviews. An interview involves asking people questions to find out about their experiences and attitudes. One problem of interviewing people is the concern of participants to tell the interviewer what they think is socially acceptable or desirable.
Observation. In naturalistic observation, the psychologist observes behaviour in real-world settings and makes no attempt to manipulate or control the situation. However, many of the observations that take place in psychology occur in the laboratory, which gives the psychologist control over factors; for this reason, there are several drawbacks to this method, such as the unnatural behaviours that result from people knowing that they are being observed.
Standardized tests. Allow the researcher to measure some aspect of the participant's behaviours and/or mental processes, and compare each individual's outcome to others that have also performed the same test.
Case Studies. Provides an in-depth examination of a single individual, from which the results may not be easily generalized to other people.
Data and Information types
Nominal Data Scale: Nominal means ‘by name’.
Used in classification or division of objects into discrete groups.
Each of which is identified with a name.
The scale does not provide any measurement within or between the categories.
Ordinal Scale: Deals with the order or position of items.
A statistical data type that exists on an arbitrary numerical scale where the exact numerical value has no significance other than to rank a set of data points.
Deals with the order or position of items such as words, letters, symbols or numbers arranged in a hierarchical order.
Quantitative assessment cannot be made.
Ratio Scale: Ratio scales tell us about the order, they tell us the exact value between units, AND they also have an absolute zero.
A ratio scale allows you to compare differences between numbers.
Good examples of ratio variables include height/length and weight.
Without a true zero, it is impossible to compute ratios.
Interval Scale: Interval scales are numeric scales in which we know not only the order, but also the exact divisions or intervals between the values.
The classic example of an interval scale is Celsius temperature.
Interval scales don’t have a “true zero.” For example, there is no such thing as “no temperature.”
An example of how the scales can be used for data collection:
Give another two examples:
Human Information Processing System
The analysis of the human information processing system requires a designer to critically analyse a range of causes and effects to identify where a potential breakdown could occur and the effect it may have. This system a person uses to interpret information and how to react normally consists of inputs, processes (which can be sensory, central and motor), and outputs.
The Human Information Processing System is part of cognitive ergonomics concerned with mental processes (perception, memory, reasoning) and motor response.
Key terms:
Short Term Memory - RAM
Long Term Memory - HDD
Short term to Long Term - Encoding
Long term to Short term - Retrieval
Sensory Memory is using senses from sound and visual to add to our Short term memory
Iconic Memory is Seen
Echoic Memory is Heard
Filtering Information is called Selective attention
The Human Information Processing System is represented using flow diagrams and characterises thinking as the environment providing input of data, which is then transformed by our senses. The information can be stored, retrieved and transformed using “mental programs”, with the results being behavioural responses.
Look at the examples below to gain a better understanding of how to apply the human information processing system to these common tasks.
Scenario 1: Using a mobile handphone. When using a mobile phone, the information flow diagram to make a telephone call
Scenario 2: Driving a Car. A car driver processes information from the road and the car and produces various control responses such as braking or changing gear.
Evaluating effects and reasons for a breakdown in the human information processing system
It is worth investigating the effects and reasons for a breakdown in the human information processing system. The flow process may break down when the information inputs may be incompatible with the sensory receptors.
At the process stage, the incoming information may be incorrect or no suitable responses to it are available.
Breakdown at a psychological and physiological level can be attributed to the ability of humans to adequately centrally process sensory information. This may be due a change in the ability to recognise particular sound frequencies or visual capabilities.
The output stage may be unable to perform the actions specified by the central processing unit.
If the sensory information is compromised then information coming into the central processing stage suitable cognitive responses may be lost, and at the output stage the body may well fail to respond at the physiological stage where physical actions are required to achieve the desired output response.
Human error has been cited as a primary cause or contributing factor in disasters and accidents in industries. This is when the flow process may break down due to the following:
Age, skills level, disability, infirmity or frailty
Young children: may not have the size, strength, fine motor control or skill to perform the tasks.
Older people: may not have the strength
People with disabilities: arthritis or Parkinson's disease, may also not have the fine motor control required.
Physical conditions: multiple sclerosis, arthritis, partial paralysis, repetitive strain injury, blindness, hearing reduced sense of feeling
An important role in maximising workplace performance and reducing the possibilities of accidents includes:
Management
Policies, safety education, decision centralization
Physical environment
Noise, temperature, pollutants, trip hazards, signage
Equipment design
Controls, visibility, hazards, warnings, safety guards
The work/job itself
Boredom and repetitiveness, mental and physical workload, musculoskeletal impacts such as force, pressure and repetition)
Social and psychological environment
Social group norms, morale
The worker
Personal ability, alertness, age, fatigue
On December 18, 2017, Amtrak Cascades passenger train 501 derailed near DuPont, Washington, United States. According to the National Transportation Safety Board's (NTSB) final report, regional transit authority Sound Transit failed to take steps to mitigate a curve at the accident location, and inadequately trained the train's engineer.
The 1986 accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine, then part of the former Soviet Union, is the only accident in the history of commercial nuclear power to cause fatalities from radiation. It was the product of a severely flawed Soviet-era reactor design, combined with human error.
Alertness: The level of vigilance, readiness or caution of an individual.
Alertness has been recognized as a critical foundation for successful decision-making across a broad range of complex and dynamic systems including aviation, air traffic control, ship navigation health-care, emergency response and military command to more ordinary but nevertheless complex tasks such as driving an automobile or bicycle.
Alertness is the key term and means being aware of what is happening in the vicinity, in order to understand how information, events, and one's own actions will impact goals and objectives, both immediately and in the near future.
One with an adept sense of situation awareness generally has a high degree of knowledge with respect to inputs and outputs of a system, i.e. an innate "feel" for situations, people, and events that play out due to variables the subject can control. Lacking or inadequate alertness has been identified as one of the primary factors in accidents attributed to human error.
Discuss how these different career roles rely on being alert at all times.
Perception: The way in which something is regarded, understood or interpreted.
Perception is the organisation, identification, and interpretation of sensory information in order to represent and understand the environment. The mind is programmed and designed to create order when confronted with many objects. The consequence of this is that human beings when using a product or service generally do not really see objects; they see classes, groups or patterns of controls and feedback.
Professional drivers, air traffic controllers, and firefighters are some of the employees required to have total and accurate situation awareness. They need to know what is going on and they have to understand what to do next in all circumstances.
Discuss how these different career roles rely on being alert at all times.
What you see is based upon the information you have, you may see the dancer spin left or right or change suddenly. To control your brain and therefore direction, hold up a mirror to the image, you will expect the direction to be mirrored and will see this evidenced even though no new information has been added.
Discuss how the way household light switched and car electric window switches might be regarded, understood or interpreted in different parts of the world. Could this possibly lead to human error within a system?
Effect of environmental factors: A set of psychological factors that can affect the performance of an individual that come from the environment that the individual is situated.
All users will respond differently to environmental factors due to noise, lighting, temperature, humidity, vibration may affect the user’s hearing, vision, general comfort and health.
Uncomfortable work environments can affect productivity and impact upon physical and mental health. Incorporating psychological physiological and cognitive ergonomics in the workplace can remedy an uncomfortable environment .
It is therefore important to optimize the environmental factors to maximize workplace performance. These simple changes help decrease stress levels, improve employee performance, reduce absenteeism and contribute to the well being of individual
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