Human Performance Enhancement Research Articles

Quality improvement in manufacturing through human performance enhancement

In the increasingly competitive global economy, survival of an industry depends on catering to customer needs by quickly producing quality products and providing quality service at an affordable price. In production, or in service, ergonomic considerations have manifested themselves in two distinct, yet related, domains. Focuses on the humans who contribute to product manufacture/service. It is frequently advocated that since humans are unreliable and less consistent, compared to machines, they are primarily responsible for lowering product and service quality. Ergonomic considerations, which, ironically, can improve human performance, are paid lip service during manufacturing system design. Compounding the problem is the current inability of most ergonomists to make ergonomic recommendations that do not run counter to the productivity and quality goals of system designers. Addresses these two issues by illustrating, through four case studies, the relationship between quality and variables that affect human performance.

Binaural Auditory Beats Affect Vigilance Performance and Mood

LANE, J. D., S. J. KASIAN, J. E. OWENS AND G. R. MARSH.Binaural auditory beats affect vigilance performance and mood. PHYSIOL BEHAV 63(2) 249–252, 1998.—When two tones of slightly different frequency are presented separately to the left and right ears the listener perceives a single tone that varies in amplitude at a frequency equal to the frequency difference between the two tones, a perceptual phenomenon known as the binaural auditory beat. Anecdotal reports suggest that binaural auditory beats within the electroencephalograph frequency range can entrain EEG activity and may affect states of consciousness, although few scientific studies have been published. This study compared the effects of binaural auditory beats in the EEG beta and EEG theta/delta frequency ranges on mood and on performance of a vigilance task to investigate their effects on subjective and objective measures of arousal. Participants (n = 29) performed a 30-min visual vigilance task on three different days while listening to pink noise containing simple tones or binaural beats either in the beta range (16 and 24 Hz) or the theta/delta range (1.5 and 4 Hz). However, participants were kept blind to the presence of binaural beats to control expectation effects. Presentation of beta-frequency binaural beats yielded more correct target detections and fewer false alarms than presentation of theta/delta frequency binaural beats. In addition, the beta-frequency beats were associated with less negative mood. Results suggest that the presentation of binaural auditory beats can affect psychomotor performance and mood. This technology may have applications for the control of attention and arousal and the enhancement of human performance.

The relationships among performance on a prototype indicator of perceptual defence/vigilance, personality, and extrasensory perception

Two experiments compare performance on a prototype indicator of perceptual defence/vigilance with performance on other related measures of individual differences. On the basis of theoretical expectations and empirical findings, participants' performance on the prototype indicator of perceptual defence/vigilance was predicted to relate to the personality factor of Neuroticism, and to performance on a forced-choice ESP task. In both experiments, perceptual defence/vigilance related as predicted to these measures: defensive participants had higher Neuroticism scores, and lower ESP scores than vigilant participants. Defensive participants also consistently showed fewer signs of mental health than vigilant participants on an exploratory self-report indicator of mental health. It is concluded that the prototype measure shows some promise as a measure of perceptual defence/vigilance, and that with further development it might have a future role in the enhancement of human performance under stress.

Tools for Human Performance Enhancement in Aviation Maintenance

Human Factors and ergonomics professionals are often asked to “show” how their research has affected on-the-job human performance. They are asked to show measurable changes in human effectiveness and efficiency at work. There is always the demand for HF&E researchers to create procedures and tools that can guide non-human factors personnel to make the “right” human-centered decisions. This symposium will show and distribute such tools that have been designed and tested in an aviation maintenance environment. For over six years now, the Federal Aviation Administration Office of Aviation Medicine has conducted an extensive research program centered on human factors in aviation maintenance and inspection. The research program has earned a reputation of demonstrating a “hands-on” understanding of aviation maintenance and maintaining a close working relationship with all segments of the industry. The symposium will begin with an overview of FAA-sponsored research results applied to aviation maintenance and safety over the past six years. In the second paper the Human Factors Guide for Aviation Maintenance, completed in 1995, will be described. The third presentation will demonstrate a CD-ROM version of the Guide. The presentation shall also discuss human-computer interface issues pertinent to developing interactive multi-media information systems. The final presentation will show a multi-media software package to conduct ergonomics audits in a variety of industrial environments. The system has evolved from three years of ergonomics audit research in aviation maintenance workplaces. Each of the session presentations will demonstrate and distribute HF&E tools to session attendees.

Learning, Remembering, Believing: Enhancing Human Performance

Learning, Remembering, Believing: Enhancing Human Performance

Learning, remembering, believing: enhancing human performance

Can such techniques as sleep learning and hypnosis improve performance? Do we sometimes confuse familiarity with mastery? Can we learn without making mistakes? These questions apply in the classroom, in the military, and on the assembly line. Learning, Remembering, Believing addresses these and other key issues in learning and performance. The volume presents leading-edge theories and findings from a wide range of research settings: from pilots learning to fly to children learning about physics by throwing beanbags. Common folklore is explored, and promising research directions are identified. The authors also continue themes from their first two volumes: Enhancing Human Performance (1988) and In the Mind's Eye (1991). The result is a thorough and readable review of * Learning and remembering. The volume evaluates the effects of subjective experience on learning--why we often overestimate what we know, why we may not need a close match between training settings and real-world tasks, and why we experience such phenomena as illusory remembering and unconscious plagiarism. * Learning and performing in teams. The authors discuss cooperative learning in different age groups and contexts. Current views on team performance are presented, including how team-learning processes can be improved and whether team-building interventions are effective. * Mental and emotional states. This is a critical review of the evidence that learning is affected by state of mind. Topics include hypnosis, meditation, sleep learning, restricted environmental stimulation, and self-confidence and the self-efficacy theory of learning. * New directions. The volume looks at two new ideas for improving performance: emotions induced by another person--socially induced affect--and strategies for controlling one's thoughts. The committee also considers factors inherent in organizations--workplaces, educational facilities, and the military--that affect whether and how they implement training programs. Learning, Remembering, Believing offers an understanding of human learning that will be useful to training specialists, psychologists, educators, managers, and individuals interested in all dimensions of human performance.

Book reviews

Book reviewed in this article:Cooperation and Prosocial Behaviour. Edited by R. A. Hinde & J. Groebel.Sleep, Sleepiness and Performance. Edited by T. H. Monk.Health Psychology: Challenging the Biomedical Model. By C. L. Sheridan & S. A. Radmacher.Situated Learning: Legitimate Peripheral Participation. By J. Lave & E. Wenger.Personality and Stress: Individual Differences in the Stress Process. Edited by C. L. Cooper & R. Payne.In the Mind's Eye: Enhancing Human Performance. Edited by D. Druckman & R. A. Bjork.Understanding Vygotsky: A Quest for Synthesis. By R. van der Veer & J. Valsiner.

In the Mind's Eye: Enhancing Human Performance

An individual lacking in self-confidence listens to a tape of the ocean surf and the cry of gulls; embedded below the threshold of hearing are affirmations, such as "I am a secure person. I believe in myself more and more every day." Will his self-esteem be enhanced? A stressed-out person feels uncomfortably revved up; she seeks out a quiet place, closes her eyes, and repeats a Sanskrit mantra. Will her heart rate be slowed? An undercover government operative makes a life-and-death decision as to whether an informant's statement is the truth or a deliberate lie; he pays close attention to the other's body cues and tone of voice. Will such signs help him to decide correctly? These questions, and more, are the subject of<i>In the</i><i>Mind's Eye: Enhancing Human Performance</i>(and the respective answers are probably not, not better than simply sitting quietly, and probably so). Following up on

Restricted Environmental Stimulation Technique Improves Human Performance: Rifle Marksmanship

This study controlled for relaxation and guided imagery confounds noted in much previous research on enhancement of human performance using the restricted environmental stimulation technique (REST). Dry flotation REST was used where subjects lay ("floated") on a salt-water-filled bladder in a sound-attenuated, light-free chamber. 9 men and 3 women in a rifle marksmanship training course, exposed to dry-flotation REST, showed significantly higher rifle marksmanship scores than the university students who as matched controls were exposed to relaxation (9 men and 3 women). Further, only the former showed a significant pre- to posttest improvement in scores, which suggests REST's positive effects on marksmanship go beyond the induction of relaxation by hypnosis. The results support hypotheses summarized in 1982 by Barabasz regarding potentiation by REST of internally generated imagery and subsequent improvement observed in a nonREST posttest environment.

In the mind's eye: Enhancing human performance

A pilot study is presented using a photographic method for participants to explore where meaning in their lives comes from. Eighty-six university students were instructed to take 9–12 photographs of “things that make your life feel meaningful.” One week later, participants returned, viewed, and described their photographs. Significant within-person improvements in levels of meaning in life, life satisfaction, and positive affect were observed following the intervention.

IDSSs opportunities and problems: Steps to development of an IDSS

IDSSs should contribute to the enhancement of human performance, but their effectiveness can be guaranteed only in the case of certain decision types. The issues explored in this paper show that they can help to overcome some human limitations, especially in complex data and information processes, in uncertainty management, and in coherent reasoning. Integrating human and machine expertise is clearly beneficial, nevertheless with the aim of building intelligent solutions we should not ignore the role of human factors and the problems deriving from the integration of knowledge of multiple experts. The risk is that the systems will become clumsy and vulnerable to embarrassing failures.

Enhancing human performance: Issues, theories, and techniques, edited by Daniel Druckman and John A. Swets. Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1988. 299 pp., $32.50 cloth, $22.50 paper

Enhancing human performance: Issues, theories, and techniques, edited by Daniel Druckman and John A. Swets. Washington, DC: National Academy Press, 1988. 299 pp., $32.50 cloth, $22.50 paper

Enhancing Human Performance: An Evaluation of “New Age” Techniques Considered by the U.S. Army

Unconventional techniques considered by the United States Army for enhancing human performance were reviewed during a two-year study by a committee of the National Research Council. Little or no scientific evidence was found to support the effectiveness of several, including neurolinguistic programming in interpersonal influence and such paranormal techniques as remote viewing and psychokinesis. Mixed results were seen to characterize other techniques, for example, group-cohesion procedures. Further study was suggested for a few, including mental practice of motor skills. Guidelines requested of the committee for future army evaluation of enhancement techniques stressed the need for, and the conduct of, both laboratory and field research. The committee recommended further consideration of mainstream research in the behavioral sciences as a basis for effective performance enhancements.

Review of Enhancing Human Performance: Issues, Theories, and Techniques.

Review of Enhancing Human Performance: Issues, Theories, and Techniques.