Extending model-based systems engineering to address human-systems integration considerations in the system life cycle

Abstract

Even though current architectural frameworks have adequate semantics to represent hardware and software system elements, they lack the requisite semantics for representing and integrating humans with the rest of the system. Systems continue to grow in scale and complexity, and human machine interactions and human machine interfaces become a crucial consideration in overall system design. In complex systems, humans are often part of the complex system as opposed to being just users of the system. Compounding the problem is the fact that current system engineering practices tend to address human considerations only as an afterthought. One primary reason for this shortcoming is that the human factors engineering community has been unable to communicate its value proposition to traditional engineering disciplines and program management. Another reason is differences in terminology between the two communities. This paper employs an Aerial Unmanned Vehicle case study to explore the benefits of using a Human System Integration Profile that extends current architecture modeling semantics to include semantics needed for human-system integration. The profile identifies core building blocks for human system interaction, human-system interfaces, and human-system integration. It also enables the integration of human-centered descriptive models with analytical models, offering new ways to conceptualize and analyze human-machine requirements and use the findings to specify design.