Human Factors Education Research Articles

Remittance as reactive transnationalism: The role of perceived unfairness among immigrants in South Korea

AbstractDespite numerous studies on the economic transnational connections of immigrants, focusing mainly on remittances to their home countries, the remittance behaviours and related factors of immigrants in South Korea, a country experiencing increased racial and ethnic diversity, remain relatively understudied. Applying a resource‐dependent and reactive transnationalism framework, this study examines the associations between assimilation, human capital, and immigrants' remittance behaviours. Additionally, we investigate whether perceived unfairness moderates these relationships, reflecting reactive transnationalism. Utilizing data from a 2021 Survey on Immigrants' Living Conditions and Labor Force (N = 7981), we delve into various remitting behaviours, including remittance frequency, the share of monthly remittances in expenditures, and the total remittance amount. The independent variables include assimilation indicators (length of stay in Korea and intention to remain), human capital factors (education and income) and perceived unfairness in the workplace. Ordinary least squares and logistic regression analyses were conducted to examine these relationships. Our findings support both linear and resource‐dependent transnationalism: assimilation and human capital levels are associated with immigrants' remittance behaviours. However, the interaction between perceived unfairness and reactive transnationalism was observed specifically for human capital, indicating that immigrants with higher human capital are more responsive to unfairness and discrimination. As a result, they may want to increase their self‐esteem by sending money back to their home country. This study not only contributes to understanding immigrant remittance behaviours in South Korea but also highlights the conceptual significance of examining remittance behaviours through reactive transnationalism, particularly the critical role of perceived unfairness among highly skilled immigrants.

Geodetector analysis of individual and joint impacts of natural and human factors on maternal and child health at the provincial scale

This ecological study examined the individual and joint impacts of natural–human factors on the spatial patterns of maternal and child health status in China at the provincial scale in 2020. We considered natural factors (forest coverage, average temperature, and total sulfur dioxide and particulate matter emissions) and human factors (economic development, urbanization, healthcare access, and education level). We combined maternal, infant, and under-five mortality rates into a composite maternal and child health index using the entropy method. The spatial autocorrelation analysis of this index highlighted distinct health patterns across provinces, whereas the geodetector method assessed the effects of natural–human factors on the patterns. A notable east–central–west stepwise decline in health status was observed. Global Moran’s I showed positive spatial clustering, with high–high clustering areas in the Yangtze River Delta and low–low clustering areas in western regions. Factor detection identified eight significant natural–human factors impacting maternal and child health, with total sulfur dioxide emission density having the greatest impact. The interaction between average schooling years and total sulfur dioxide emission notably affected maternal and child health patterns. The study concludes that natural–human factors critically affect the spatial distribution of maternal and child health.

Academic Options: Teaching-Intensive Institutions

The expectations and demands within undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral academic positions can vary greatly when considering teaching, research, and service. Human factors academics-in-training who enjoy teaching and are passionate about developing a pipeline of human factors practitioners or educators, might want to consider academic positions in a teaching-intensive college or university. The panelists will provide information on (1) the qualifications sought by teaching institutions during the hiring process; (2) the expectations of teaching, research, and service in teaching-intensive programs; (3) differences in the populations served, job incentives, and rewards; and (4) how some teachers maintain an active research program and/or consulting activities.

Multidisciplinary Projects for Human Factors Courses

Multidisciplinary and interdisciplinary work are at the core of human factors research, both in academia and in industry. Working and communicating with those in other disciplines, from computer science to the humanities, is a necessary skill for graduates of human factors programs. Traditional introductory human factors courses include an applied component, usually an individual or group project, that gives students experience with the many tools they will need in the future, from task analysis to making conclusions based on participant data. Here we describe experiences in extending that coursework to include multidisciplinary interactions in applied contexts. Recommendations include using similar methods to broaden human factors education and including experiences with those in different roles and backgrounds than human factors.

The Human Capital of the Freelancers and Their Satisfaction with the Quality of Life

Digital technologies are underpinning a wide range of products, services, processes, and business model innovations that are significantly transforming industries, organizations, and society. They are increasingly permeating every aspect of our daily lives. In this paper, we looked at the challenges of digitalization, leading to a new way of working in the market and new business models, such as the gig economy. Individuals are becoming more mobile and self-directed in their careers, as opposed to traditional careers. We investigated the demographic characteristics of the new, growing group of self-employed, so-called freelancers, at the national level in Slovenia and investigated the relationships between human capital and their subjective (job and career satisfaction, life satisfaction) and objective success (income satisfaction). The survey was conducted among 200 freelancers (respondents). The empirical results show that most Slovenian freelancers working from home work in professional, scientific, and technical occupations; are between 35 and 44 years old; have completed the second level of tertiary education; work more than 40 hours per week; and have 16 years or more of work experience. To explore the quality of life of freelancers, empirical analysis showed that human capital factors are important for the success of a new career as a freelancer. The results show that freelancers’ human capital factors (education and experience, skills, and training) positively influence subjective and objective success. Using structural equation modeling, we also confirmed that human capital has a greater impact on freelancers’ subjective success (life satisfaction, career satisfaction) than on objective success (income satisfaction), suggesting that job and life satisfaction should be considered an important resource that freelancers rely on to determine their quality of life.

Student Perspectives on Changing Requirements for Human Factors Engineering Education

In today’s digital economy, the Internet of Things (IoT) has connected devices, humans, and everyday objects to each other in ways that were unimaginable before. Vast amounts of data are collected everywhere and disrupting how we design systems and products. Data science and emerging technologies offer challenges and opportunities for early-career human factors professionals who are looking to grow their careers and their human factors practice. In this paper, we report on a survey to assess the perspectives of students currently studying human factors. The survey items examined shortfalls in current human factors education with re-spect to relevance to industry trends. The survey results show that students see a need to include more relevant subjects in data science, as well as opportunities to learn trending industry problems, hands-on experience with real-life projects, prior to graduation.

Reshaping Human Factors Education in Times of Big Data: Practitioner Perspectives

Human Factors Engineering (HFE) is an applied discipline that uses a wide range of methodologies to better the design of systems and devices for human use. Underpinning all human factors design is the maxim to fit the human to the task/machine/system rather than vice versa. While some HFE methods such as task analysis and anthropometrics remain relatively fixed over time, areas such as human-technology interaction are strongly influenced by the fast-evolving technological trend. In times of big data, human factors engineers need to have a good understanding of topics like machine learning, advanced data analytics, and data visualization so that they can design data-driven products that involve big data sets. There is a natural lag between industrial trends and HFE curricula, leading to gaps between what people are taught and what they will need to know. In this paper, we present the results of a survey involving HFE practitioners (N=101) and we demonstrate the need for including data science and machine learning components in HFE curricula.

The development of an elearning program on the response and recognition of the deteriorating patient using self-study methodology

eLearning may be part of the solution to manage the ongoing training needs of nurses in Australian hospitals. A focus on addressing a knowledge gap in the recognition of and response to the deteriorating patient provided an opportunity to develop an eLearning program. Human factors education was incorporated as an innovative key feature in the eLearning program. A self-study methodological approach was applied to simultaneously research the development process and to integrate an evaluation of the resulting eLearning program. Critical friends were consulted during the planning and development of the eLearning program to ensure that the final program was engaging while also being successful in supporting learning. The resulting eLearning program was evaluated with a cohort of nurses who participated in pre and post test questionnaires and focus group discussions. Nurses reported that the inclusion of a realistic, interactive case study game as a learning device was valuable and resulted in self reflection about experiences in managing deteriorating patients. These findings suggest that eLearning programs can be successful in increasing nurses’ confidence in managing the deteriorating patient, reading the track and trigger charts, applying human factors education, and may result in improved in patient outcomes.

Awareness of Human Factors in the operating theatres during the COVID-19 pandemic.

One of the priorities at our large Operating Theatres Department is to support awareness and basic education of the multi-disciplinary teams in clinical Human Factors, to help build competence and capacity in healthcare towards a resilient system. From May 2019 until February 2020, our Human Factors Champions embarked on a project called Observation of Non-technical Skills and Teamwork in the operating theatres (ONSeT), to monitor and evaluate the benefits of local Human Factors education. In September 2020, six months after the COVID-19 pandemic hit the UK and caused a major disruption of surgical services, we decided to investigate the usefulness of the project and the impact of COVID-19 in the operating theatres, looking through the eyes of the Human Factors Champions. Results pointed to a consensus about ONSeT having helped during the pandemic, with regards to how teams worked and in enabling team leaders to be more responsive. Human Factors Champions found that feedback on performance was received in a non-threatening way and observation of performance became ‘second nature’. As organisations need to develop critical thinking, we think that the ONSeT project has helped us build some capacity for this, from the front-line onwards.

The Education of the Human Factors Engineer in the Age of Data Science

The continued advances in artificial intelligence and automation through machine learning applications, under the heading of data science, gives reason for pause within the educator community as we consider how to position future human factors engineers to contribute meaningfully in these projects. Do the lessons we learned and now teach regarding automation based on previous generations of technology still apply? What level of DS and ML expertise is needed for a human factors engineer to have a relevant role in the design of future automation? How do we integrate these topics into a field that often has not emphasized quantitative skills? This panel discussion brings together human factors engineers and educators at different stages of their careers to consider how curricula are being adapted to include data science and machine learning, and what the future of human factors education may look like in the coming years.

Tertiary education in ergonomics and human factors: quo vadis?

In 2019, the Human Factors and Ergonomics (HFE) discipline turned 70; to celebrate, an international group of academics and educators have reflected on the status of HFE tertiary education across the globe. This paper draws on presentations and discussions from the 20th Triennial International Ergonomics Association (IEA) conference and considers the implications for HFE education programmes. Past, current, and future challenges are outlined and discussed with examples from different countries and programmes. This paper builds on 2012 strategy proposed by Dul and colleagues, to strengthen the demand, and application, of the HFE discipline and profession. It provides a considered set of reflections, noting the range of structural issues and financial pressures within the tertiary education system that create challenges for the viability of specialist programmes such as HFE. A need exists for the broader profession to collaborate and share innovations in HFE programme development, to ensure sustainable HFE education programmes. Practitioner summary: A range of structural issues and financial pressures exist within the tertiary education system that creates challenges for the viability of specialist programmes such as HFE. A need exists for the broader profession to collaborate and share innovations in HFE programme development, to ensure sustainable HFE education programmes. Abbreviation: HFE: Human Factors and Ergonomics; IEA: International Ergonomics Association; CIEHF: Chartered Institute of Ergonomics & Human Factors; UX: User Experience; CREE: Centre for Registration of European Ergonomist; BRICSplus: Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa; MOOCS: Massive Open Online Courses; STST: socio technical systems theory; LMIC: low and middle-income countries

Utilizing the Generalized Intelligent Framework for Tutoring (GIFT) for Human Factors Education

Human Factors educators teach a variety of different types of classes including in-person, mixed mode, and online. The Generalized Intelligent Framework for Tutoring (GIFT) is a free, open-source domain-independent intelligent tutoring system (ITS) framework that can be leveraged by Human Factors educators for use in their own classes. GIFT includes authoring tools that are easy to use and do not require a background in computer science or ITSs. This demonstration is interactive and shows an overview of the tools and features of GIFT that can be used by Human Factors educators. It also provides context by showing a GIFT course in a Human Factors relevant area, and discusses how GIFT has and can be used in the classroom. As GIFT is open-source and continually being developed, the presenters provide the conference attendees an opportunity to give feedback about useful improvements that could be made to GIFT.

Putting the Applied in Applied Psychology: Experiential Learning Projects in the HFE Classroom

The objective of this panel is to open a dialog about how experiential learning is being represented within the human factors and ergonomic classroom. The panel will start by Heather Lum briefly giving an overview and the precipice for this discussion panel. The panelists will then provide their views and experiences regarding this topic. Gabriella Hancock will discuss how she prepares her students for ‘publish or perish’ through a hands-on assignment. Grace Waldfogle will discuss how her undergraduate applied project prepared her for graduate education in human factors. Federico Scholcover will share his experiences with a semester long design project and how he uses what he learned there in a job setting. Finally, Nicholas Kelling will discuss the industry-academia collaborative process and how it prepares students for life beyond the classroom. The specific theme of this discussion panel is focused on the differing perspectives that one might face rom either the instructor and student perspectives. Dr. Lum will foster discussion among the panelists and questions from the general audience. Discussion time: 90 minutes.

A Human Factors Engineering Education Perspective on Data Science, Machine Learning and Automation

The explosion of data science (DS) in all areas of technology coupled with the rapid growth of machine learning (ML) techniques in the last decade create novel applications in automation. Many working with DS techniques rely on the concept of “black boxes” to explain how ML works, noting that algorithms find patterns in the data that humans might not. While the mathematics are still being developed, the implications for the application of ML, specifically to questions of automation, also are being studied, but still remain poorly understood. The decisions made by ML practitioners with respect to data selection, model training and testing, data visualization, and model applications remain relatively unconstrained and have the potential to yield unexpected results at the systems level. Unfortunately, human factors engineers concerned with automation often have limited training and awareness of DS and ML applications and are unable to provide the meaningful guidance that is needed to ensure the future safety of these newly emerging automated systems. Moreover, undergraduate and graduate programs in human factors engineering (HFE) have not kept pace with these developments and future HFEs may continue to find themselves unable to contribute meaningfully to the development of automated systems based on algorithms derived from ML. In this paper, human factors engineers and educators explore some of the challenges to our understanding of automation posed by specific ML techniques and contrast this with an outline of some of the historical work in HFE that has contributed to our understanding of safe and effective automation. Examples are provided from more conventional applications using both supervised and unsupervised learning techniques, that are explored with respect to implications for algorithm performance, use in system automation, and the potential for unintended results. Implications for human factors engineering education are discussed.

Are “Human Factors Engineers” Prepared for the Medical Device Industry? – Preliminary Findings from an Interactive Poster Survey

As the medical device industry establishes more rigorous human factors practices in their design and development process, this is accompanied by an increase in demand in human factors professionals. The human factors activities have been performed by both professionals with formal human factors education and training and those who come from other backgrounds, such as engineering, natural science, medical fields, design and more. Both across those disciplines and the within human factors field, there is no standard curriculum or requirements for educating and preparing human factors engineers/professionals for the medical device/health care domain. To better understand how (well) human factors professionals are prepared for the medical device industry, a survey was administered in the form of an interactive poster at the 2019 International Symposium in Human Factors and Ergonomics in Health Care. Data were collected regarding where symposium attendees, most of whom are human factors professionals in health care/medical device, learned the important knowledge/skills required for human factors practice in the medical device industry. In this paper, the method is described in details, and results from the poster survey are presented and discussed.

Putting the Applied in Applied Psychology: Experiential Learning Projects in the HFE Classroom

The objective of this panel is to open a dialog about how experiential learning is being represented within the human factors and ergonomic classroom. The panel will start by Heather Lum briefly giving an overview and the precipice for this discussion panel. The panelists will then provide their views and experiences regarding this topic. Gabriella Hancock will discuss how she prepares her students for ‘publish or perish’ through a hands-on assignment. Grace Waldfogle will discuss how her undergraduate applied project prepared her for graduate education in human factors. Federico Scholcover will share his experiences with a semester long design project and how he uses what he learned there in a job setting. Finally, Nicholas Kelling will discuss the industry-academia collaborative process and how it prepares students for life beyond the classroom. The specific theme of this discussion panel is focused on the differing perspectives that one might face rom either the instructor and student perspectives. Dr. Lum will foster discussion among the panelists and questions from the general audience. Discussion time: 90 minutes.

Dentists are humans too - education in human factors within dental care.

The role of human factors in healthcare has become increasingly well recognised, particularly following the Francis inquiry into the failings in care at the Mid Staffordshire NHS Foundation Trust and Berwick Reports. The recognition of human factors in dentistry, particularly in primary care, is less well developed. This paper aims to explore the relevance of human factors in dentistry and highlight the importance of considering their role in any adverse patient outcomes and, importantly for the future, the continued recognition and integration of teaching about human factors in healthcare in both undergraduate and postgraduate education.

A biologically inspired cognitive skills measurement approach

Abstract Cognitive Skills (CS) are essential for job interviews and government policymaking. We have no existing work that can predict CS during interviews and policymaking. The current work proposes CS measurement method that simulates the nonlinear relationship between CS and Basic Human Factor (BHF) (aging, infection, emotions, awareness, personality, education, and experience). Firstly, the method obtains conditional probabilities of CS with respect to BHF using training data set. Secondly, particular domains and ranges are define for BHF. Based on the conditional probabilities of CS, the technique divide training data set into three partitions that result in three model equations for CS measurement method. Moreover, the propose method divides into three algorithms. The first algorithm estimates values for BHF. The second algorithm verifies the estimated values of BHF while the third algorithm predicts CS values by using the estimated values of BHF. During the experiment, the propose method test on test data set. We achieve the prediction accuracy of the method through Mean Forecast Error (MFE), Mean Absolute Deviation (MAD) and Tracking Signal (TS) measures. The results show that the accuracy of the method is 91 % . Finally, we discuss these results as well as the comparison of the current method with competitive methods.

The influence of human capital factors and context on women's entrepreneurship: Which matters more?

Abstract This paper explores whether human capital factors (education and perceived capabilities) or contextual factors (economic and political settings) explain differential start-up rates between men and women entrepreneurs, connecting data from the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor (GEM) with the World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap. Results show that the effects of economic participation and entrepreneurship specific human capital (perceived capabilities) both play a role influencing the start-up rates of women entrepreneurs.

Exploring the Future of Human Factors Education

The objective of this panel was to examine how the future of human factors education is changing given the influx of technology, a push for online learning, and adapting to the changing market. The panel will begin by Heather Lum briefly giving an overview and the precipice for this discussion panel. The panelists will provide their views and experiences regarding this topic. Kelly Steelman will discuss the potential for MOOCs and other online formats to create faster and more flexible postgraduate programs. Christina Frederick will discuss her perspectives on the technological skills we should be equipping our human factors graduates with to be successful. Nathan Sonnenfeld will give his unique take on this as a graduate student currently obtaining a human factors education. Susan Amato-Henderson will discuss the Next Generation Science Standards and the ramifications for educators. Lastly, Thomas Smith will focus on the advantages and disadvantages of online learning at the K-12 level. Dr. Lum will foster discussion among the panelists and questions from the general audience. Discussion time: 90 minutes.