Psychophysical acceptability as a constraint in manual working capacity.

Abstract

Psychophysical theory and its use in establishing maximum acceptable workloads are briefly reviewed. A distinction is made between psychophysical criteria for static strength, and psychophysical criteria for dynamic strength. The experimental protocol and equipment developed during the series of Liberty Mutual studies is described. These studies used industrial workers in a controlled environment to develop maximum acceptable weights and forces for the basic manual handling tasks. Two recent experiments investigating task frequency and object size are also described. It is concluded that minor changes should be made in the tables of maximum acceptable weights and forces published by Snook [576].