ergonomics+and+health

 =**__ERGONOMICS    __**=

**__Introduction__**

According to Wikipedia, "**Ergonomics** is the scientific discipline concerned with designing according to the human needs, and the profession that applies theory, principles, data and methods to design in order to optimize human well-being and overall system performance. The field is also called human engineering, and human factors.

There are five aspects of ergonomics: safety, comfort, ease of use, productivity/performance, and aesthetics. Based on these aspects of ergonomics, examples are given of how products or systems could benefit from redesign based on ergonomic principles. >   __**Background**__
 * 1) Safety - Medicine bottles: The print on them could be larger so that a sick person who may have impaired vision (due to sinuses, etc.) can more easily see the dosages and label. Ergonomics could design the print style, color and size for optimal viewing.
 * 2) <span style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif">Comfort - Alarm clock display: Some displays are harshly bright, drawing one’s eye to the light when surroundings are dark. Ergonomic principles could redesign this based on contrast principles.
 * 3) <span style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif">Ease of use - Street Signs: In a strange area, many times it is difficult to spot street signs. This could be addressed with the principles of visual detection in ergonomics.
 * 4) <span style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif">Productivity/performance - HD TV: The sound on HD TV is much lower than regular TV. So when you switch from HD to regular, the volume increases dramatically. Ergonomics recognizes that this difference in decibel level creates a difference in loudness and hurts human ears and this could be solved by evening out the decibel levels. Voicemail instructions: It takes too long to have to listen to all of the obvious instructions. Ergonomics could address this by providing more options to the user, enabling them to easily and quickly skip the instructions.
 * 5) <span style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif">Aesthetics - Signs in the workplace: Signage should be made consistent throughout the workplace to not only be aesthetically pleasing, but also so that information is easily accessible for all signs."

"The foundations of the science of ergonomics appear to have been laid within the context of the culture of Ancient Greece. A good deal of evidence indicates that Hellenic civilization in the 5th century BCE used ergonomic principles in the design of their tools, jobs, and workplaces. One outstanding example of this can be found in the description Hippocrates gave of how a surgeon's workplace should be designed (see Marmaras, Poulakakis and Papakostopoulos, 1999). The term ergonomics is derived from the Greek words //ergon// [work] and //nomos// [natural laws] and first entered the modern lexicon when Wojciech Jastrzębowski used the word in his 1857 article //Rys ergonomji czyli nauki o pracy, opartej na prawdach poczerpniętych z Nauki Przyrody// (The Outline of Ergonomics, i.e. Science of Work, Based on the Truths Taken from the Natural Science). Later in the 19th century Frederick Winslow Taylor pioneered the "Scientific Management" method, which proposed a way to find the optimum method for carrying out a given task. Taylor found that he could, for example, triple the amount of coal that workers were shoveling by incrementally reducing the size and weight of coal shovels until the fastest shoveling rate was reached. Frank and Lillian Gilbreth expanded Taylor's methods in the early 1900s to develop "Time and Motion Studies". They aimed to improve efficiency by eliminating unnecessary steps and actions. By applying this approach, the Gilbreths reduced the number of motions in bricklaying from 18 to 4.5, allowing bricklayers to increase their productivity from 120 to 350 bricks per hour. World War II marked the development of new and complex machines and weaponry, and these made new demands on operators' cognition. The decision-making, attention, situational awareness and hand-eye coordination of the machine's operator became key in the success or failure of a task. It was observed that fully functional aircraft, flown by the best-trained pilots, still crashed. In 1943, Alphonse Chapanis, a lieutenant in the U.S. Army, showed that this so-called "pilot error" could be greatly reduced when more logical and differentiable controls replaced confusing designs in airplane cockpits. In the decades since the war, ergonomics has continued to flourish and diversify. The Space Age created new human factors issues such as weightlessness and extreme g-forces. How far could environments in space be tolerated, and what effects would they have on the mind and body? The dawn of the Information Age has resulted in the new ergonomics field of human-computer interaction (HCI). Likewise, the growing demand for and competition among consumer goods and electronics has resulted in more companies including human factors in product design. At home, work, or play new problems and questions must be resolved constantly. People come in all different shapes and sizes, and with different capabilities and limitations in strength, speed, judgment, and skills. All of these factors need to be considered in the design function. To solve design problems, physiology and psychology must be included with a engineering approach."

<span style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif">**__How it Works__** "Design of Ergonomics Experiments There is a specific series of steps that should be used in order to properly design an ergonomics experiment. First, one should select a problem that has practical impact. The problem should support or test a current theory. The user should select one or a few dependent variable(s) which usually measures safety, health, and/or physiological performance. Independent variable(s) should also be chosen at different levels. Normally, this involves paid participants, the existing environment, equipment, and/or software. When testing the users, one should give careful instructions describing the method or task and then get voluntary consent. The user should recognize all the possible combinations and interactions to notice the many differences that could occur. Multiple observations and trials should be conducted and compared to maximize the best results. Once completed, redesigning within and between subjects should be done to vary the data. It is often that permission is needed from the Institutional Review Board before an experiment can be done. A mathematical model should be used so that the data will be clear once the experiment is completed. The experiment starts with a pilot test. Make sure in advance that the subjects understand the test, the equipment works, and that the test is able to be finished within the given time. When the experiment actually begins, the subjects should be paid for their work. All times and other measurements should be carefully measured and recorded. Once all the data is compiled, it should be analyzed, reduced, and formatted in the right way. A report explaining the experiment should be written. It should often display statistics including an ANOVA table, plots, and means of central tendency. A final paper should be written and edited after numerous drafts to ensure an adequate report is the final product.

Ergonomics in the workplace

Outside of the discipline itself, the term 'ergonomics' is generally used to refer to physical ergonomics as it relates to the workplace (as in for example ergonomic chairs and keyboards). Ergonomics in the workplace has to do largely with the safety of employees, both long and short-term. Ergonomics can help reduce costs by improving safety. This would decrease the money paid out in workers’ compensation. For example, over five million workers sustain overextension injuries per year. Through ergonomics, workplaces can be designed so that workers do not have to overextend themselves and the manufacturing industry could save billions in workers’ compensation. Workplaces may either take the reactive or proactive approach when applying ergonomics practices. Reactive ergonomics is when something needs to be fixed, and corrective action is taken. Proactive ergonomics is the process of seeking areas that could be improved and fixing the issues before they become a large problem. Problems may be fixed through equipment design or task design. Equipment design changes the actual, physical devices used by people. Task design changes what people do with the equipment. Environmental design changes the environment in which people work, but not the physical equipment they use."


 * __Social and Ethical Issues__**
 * Reliability- People are all different individuals, and may have different opinions about what works better for themselves. Therefore, decisions made about what works best for people may not work for some.
 * Policy and Standards- Standards are made in businesses and companies to have better interfaces in their software, making it more accessible and simple to use, as well as health standards, so that employees are not worn out or do not have bad posture, for example.
 * People and machines- Employees in an office will use computers in many offices today, and the software/interfaces are engineered to be simple enough for the people to use as well as complex enough to satisfy all the needs of the business. The issue is that some people are more computer-oriented than others.

__**References**__
 * <span style="FONT-FAMILY: Verdana, Geneva, sans-serif">Unknown. "Ergonomics." __Wikipedia__. 23 Oct. 2008. 29 Oct. 2008 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ergonomics.