The ability of human beings to discriminate signals and the length of time taken to arrive at different forms of decisions are considered in this section. Finally, we discuss the way in which ageing and training can affect decision making. 10.4.1 Discrimination of Signals If there are 10 lamps lit in a room, and one […]
Category: CONTROL ROOM DESIGN AND ERGONOMICS
JOB SKILLS
In the modern control room, the operator will generally have some of the following tasks: 1. Start up/stop the system 2. Control, manoeuvre, and regulate 3. Check, monitor (act only when there is a fault) 4. Keep records and report 5. Repair and maintain 6. Plan, programme, and analyse Different types of skill and knowledge […]
Other Sense Organs
Human beings have a number of other sense organs, such as the senses of taste, touch, and smell. These, however, are not of any great use as information channels in the control room. Their importance may be for warning—for example, of dangerous gases—but one should never rely on the sense of smell for this. Of […]
Hearing
The organs of hearing are in certain respects better adapted to receiving signals than are those of sight. This applies particularly to the recognition of complex patterns. Even in the presence of noise and complex sounds from a machine installation, a trained ear can easily detect deviations and diagnose faults. The ability of the ear […]
The EffECTs of Aging
Increasing age brings decrements in various aspects of visual ability. For example, speed accommodation (distance setting) is reduced considerably with age. The eyes of older people therefore become sensitive to light of widely differing wavelengths on the same picture, resulting in an accommodation problem. In addition, the ability to discriminate luminance differences and between colours […]
Colour Blindness
Colour blindness is an important factor that must be taken into account in the design of colour VDU screens. About 8% of all males and 0.4% of all females have some form of colour vision deficiency. Table 10.6 shows the ways in which light seen by someone with normal vision as red, green, blue, or […]
Focusing of Colours on the Lens
All types of lenses, including the lens in the human eye, focus light of different wavelengths to different extents; blue is focused nearer the lens and red farther away from the lens. This means that if light containing a large difference in wavelengths is presented to the eye—for example, violet-blue and red on the same […]
Central Vision
Figure 10.5 shows a cross-section of a human eye. The incoming light is focused by the lens and falls onto the retina that lines the back of the eye. Different parts of the retina have different types of light-sensitive cells on them. In the central section TABLE 10.5 Coloured Light on Different Coloured Surfaces surface/ […]
Colour Vision
Colour is not a physical quantity but a psychological one (see Figure 10.3). Electromagnetic waves are converted by the eyes and the visual nerve centre, including the visual parts of the brain cortex, and are experienced by humans in different ways. These different experiences are called colour. In the human retina there are thought to […]
Sight and Vision
The most important factors that determine the efficiency of the sense of sight are: 1. Luminance Discrimination—The ability to distinguish differences and variations in brightness. 2. Sharpness—The ability to define and differentiate shapes. 3. Temporal Visual Ability—The ability to distinguish changes and movements over time. 4. Depth Discrimination—The ability to judge depth (variation in image […]