Visual Display Terminal Tasks Research Articles

An overview of standards and guidelines for visual display terminals

This paper provides a discussion of several standards and guidelines for design of visual display terminal (VDT) workplaces. The material represents products of government agencies, commercial standards organisations and of labour unions. Seven documents are reviewed: US MIL STD 1472-C, German DIN 66234, British HSE, Swedish ISO Proposal, British APEX, US NYCOSH, and Australian ACTU-VTHC. There is considerable disagreement in the specification of design parameters in these standards. The issues are discussed in terms of their importance and the availability of supporting ergonomics research. There are several types of VDT tasks and the number and variety of applications are growing rapidly. Due to these factors and the development of new display technologies, different recommendations may be appropriate depending upon the task and the technology. Research and careful deliberation will be required to deal with this development.