Engineering Commons^™

Factors Affecting Drivers’ Off-Road Glance Behavior While Interacting With In-Vehicle Voice Interfaces – Insights From A Secondary Data Analysis, Fangda Zhang

Doctoral Dissertations

Given the prevalence of in-vehicle technologies and the critical role of visual attention plays in driving safety, this dissertation work aimed to fill the research gap that 1) little was known about the visual demands associated with a driver engaging with in-vehicle voice interfaces; 2) the concurrent effect of interacting with in-vehicle voice interfaces and other commonly discussed individual-level factors has barely been targeted. This research work was a secondary data analysis based on a large-scale field experiment wherein 144 participants had been recruited and driven a test vehicle while performing a series of tasks using voice-based interfaces. Pre- and …

An Investigation Of Barriers And Facilitators To Living Kidney Donation, Rachel E. Crenshaw

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

There is strong interest in increasing living kidney donation, as the need for kidney transplants is quite high. Although previous studies outline some barriers and facilitators associated with donating, living kidney donation comprises only a small percentage of overall kidney transplants and thus further research on factors influencing the decision to donate is needed to find ways to increase the donor pool. Ten semi-structured interviews of living kidney donors were completed and analyzed for common themes that either support the current literature or surface additional barriers and facilitators. In addition, a systematic review and analysis of social medial support groups …

The Role Of Psychological Reactance In Smart Home Energy Management Systems, Matthew Thomas Heatherly

Masters Theses

“With an ever-growing demand for energy, our increasing consumption is producing more greenhouse gases and other pollutants, impacting climate change. One approach to reducing residential energy consumption is through the use of smart energy management systems. However, automation from smart technology inherently removes a certain amount of control from the user. If loss of control is perceived as a loss of freedom, this may lead users to experience psychological reactance when using these products. A set of experiments was conducted to assess how three features of a message notification from smart home energy management systems may induce reactance in users. …

Combining Human Factors And Data Science Methods To Evaluate The Use Of Free Text Communication Orders In Electronic Health Records, Swaminathan Kandaswamy

Doctoral Dissertations

Medication errors are a leading cause of death in the United States. Electronic Health Records (EHR) along with Computerized Provider Order Entry (CPOE) are considered promising ways to reduce these errors. However, EHR systems have not eliminated medication errors. Moreover, in some cases they have facilitated errors due to issues such as poor usability and negative effects on clinical workflows. The use of unexpected free text within a CPOE system can serve as a marker that the system does not adequately support clinical workflow. Prior studies have looked at the use of free text within medication orders, but the inclusion …

The Promise Of Vr Headsets: Validation Of A Virtual Reality Headset-Based Driving Simulator For Measuring Drivers’ Hazard Anticipation Performance, Ganesh Pai Mangalore

Masters Theses

The objective of the current study is to evaluate the use of virtual reality (VR) headsets to measure driving performance. This is desirable because they are several orders of magnitude less expensive and, if validated, could greatly extend the powers of simulation. Out of several possible measures of performance that could be considered for evaluating VR headsets, the current study specifically examines drivers’ latent hazard anticipation behavior both because it has been linked to crashes and because it has been shown to be significantly poorer in young drivers compared to their experienced counterparts in traditional driving simulators and in open …

The Application Of Usability Engineering Methods To Evaluate And Improve A Clinical Decision Support System, Kristine Desotto

Masters Theses

Delays in the process of diagnosing and treating cancer are common and lead to confusion and undesirable outcomes. Care coordinators are often embedded within the system of care to manage follow-up care. Electronic and real-time reminder systems can be used to support the care coordinator’s work, but electronic health record (EHR) usability is known to be poor. This study, completed in collaboration with the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Connecticut Healthcare System, evaluated the Cancer Coordination and Tracking System (CCTS), an EHR-linked, web-based tool for cancer care management.

A set of expert-driven and user-driven usability engineering methods was applied to …

Human-Machine Interface Development For Modifying Driver Lane Change Behavior In Manual, Automated, And Shared Control Automated Driving, Walter Joseph Talamonti

Wayne State University Dissertations

Rear-end crashes are common on U.S. roads. Driver assistance and automated driving technologies can reduce rear-end crashes (among other crash types as well). Braking is assumed for forward collision warning (FCW) and automatic emergency braking (AEB) systems. Braking is also used for adaptive cruise control (ACC) and in automated driving systems more generally. However, steering may be advised in an emergency if the adjacent lane is clear and braking is unlikely to avoid a collision. Steering around an obstacle when feasible also eliminates the risk of becoming the new forward collision hazard. Driver assist technology like emergency steer assist (ESA) …

The Effect Of Interruptions On Primary Task Performance In Safety-Critical Environments, Cheryl Ann Nicholas

Doctoral Dissertations

Safety critical systems in medicine utilize alarms to signal potentially life threatening situations to professionals and patients. In particular, in the medical field multiple alarms from equipment are activated daily and often simultaneously. There are a number of alarms which require caregivers to take breaks in complex, primary tasks to attend to the interruption task which is signaled by the alarm. The motivation for this research is the knowledge that, in general, interrupting tasks can have a potentially negative impact on performance and outcomes of the primary task. The focus of this research is on the effect of an interrupting …

Engineering Hospital Discharge Instructions: An Eye-Tracking Based Study, Haley Marie Vaigneur

All Theses

With new healthcare reform initiatives, (e.g., the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act) hospitals have additional requirements to reduce avoidable readmissions. This results in identifying the needs for improving the hospital discharge process, improving care transitions and discharge instructions, and increasing overall patient health literacy. In terms of discharge instructions, one of the most influential factors to patients' understanding and compliance with their prescribed health regimen is the document's readability. The study goal is to examine how adjusting the discharge instructions' reading level and using human factors design guidelines can influence a novice user's ability to read, comprehend, and recall …

Investigating Teenage Drivers' Driving Behavior Before And After Lag (Less Aggressive Goals) Training Program, Jingyi Zhang

Masters Theses

Motor vehicle crashes are a leading cause of death during adolescence, with the fatal crash rate per mile-driven for 16-19 years old drivers being nearly 3 times larger than the rate for drivers age 20 and older. High gravitational events among teenage drivers, such as quick starts, and hard stops, have been shown to be highly correlated with crash rates. The current younger driver training programs developed in the late 1990s, however, do not appear to be especially effective in regard to many skills which are critical to avoiding crashes. With this in mind, a simulator-based training program aimed at …

The Relationship Among Hfacs Levels And Analysis Of Human Factors In Unmanned And Manned Air Vehicles, Veysel Yesilbas

Engineering Management & Systems Engineering Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation analyzes the structural relationships among the Human Factors Accident Classification System levels for unmanned air vehicle and manned air vehicle accidents and the common relationships between unmanned air vehicle and manned air vehicle accident causes. The study acquired DOD HFACS accident classification data from 347 United States Air Force Class A accident reports for the years between 2000 and 2013.

The dissertation utilized a set of analysis that is considered to contribute substantially to the respective domain of the study. The correlations found among categorical levels were applied to HFACS taxonomy based on the Reason Model via path …

A Theoretical Adaptive Autonomy Model: Real-Time Physiological Assessment Of Cognitive Workload, Dakota C. Evans

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Increases in modern-day system complexity, has led for a need to improve human performance and the interaction between the two. Three objectives: (1) to investigate physiological measures as indicators of cognitive workload, (2) to assess cognitive workload during human interaction with different autonomy levels, and (3) to develop a theoretical model for an adaptive autonomous system that changes with real-time cognitive workload measures were addressed. This effort seeks to improve human computer interaction by providing the human with the acceptable level of computer automation based on real-time cognitive state. Two experiments involved collection of measures of subject physiology, subjective survey …

Emergency Response Manufacturing: Lead Time Minimization And Human Factors For Ozone Water Filter Assembly And Kitting Process, Travis Gary

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

In the unfortunate event of a natural disaster affecting San Luis Obispo, response from national entities cannot be relied upon for a timely or efficient response. Local disaster recovery is superior because it minimizes response time, the need for costly stockpiling and creates a solution that is uniquely suited to the community that empowers local people in their most troubled times. Extensive planning is required for local disaster recovery and this project aims to provide the research and recovery system design required to implement an effective recovery plan.

Potable water is the primary need for people in the disaster situations …

A Meta-Analysis Of Human Factors Analysis And Classification System Causal Factors: Establishing Benchmarking Standards And Human Error Latent Failure Pathway Associations In Various Domains, Katherine Berry

All Dissertations

Many models of accident investigation have been created and have served as the basis for other tools and techniques. One of the most prominent techniques, Reason's Swiss Cheese Model (1990), is based on the idea of active and latent failures. Expanding on this idea, the Human Factors Analysis and Classification System (HFACS) was created with the idea to associate contributing factors and errors (Wiegmann & Shappell, 2003).
While HFACS has been frequently applied in the field of aviation in literature, other industry types are under-represented. Seventeen data sources encompassing various industry types were collected and included in this dissertation analysis. …

Assessing Living Arrangements In Residential Halls, Romel Penaflor Auza

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Hundreds of thousands of high school graduates head off to college each fall not knowing the environment they'll be living in for the next four years. The factors that predict success in the academic, social, and personal aspect of these freshmen students' lives revolves around one aspect that is often times overlooked. Freshmen students are subjected to the fast paced lifestyle of college and often times they need to feel “at home”. Their personal space becomes a matter that is important to them in relation to their success in the three aspects of academic success, social integration, and personal health. …

Task Analysis, Modeling, And Automatic Identification Of Elemental Tasks In Robot-Assisted Laparoscopic Surgery, Lavie Pinchas Golenberg

Wayne State University Dissertations

Robotic microsurgery provides many advantages for surgical operations, including tremor filtration, an increase in dexterity, and smaller incisions. There is a growing need for a task analyses on robotic laparoscopic operations to understand better the tasks involved in robotic microsurgery cases. A few research groups have conducted task observations to help systems automatically identify surgeon skill based on task execution. Their gesture analyses, however, lacked depth and their class libraries were composed of ambiguous groupings of gestures that did not share contextual similarities.

A Hierarchical Task Analysis was performed on a four-throw suturing task using a robotic microsurgical platform. Three …

Data Entry Error In Mobile Keyboard Device Usage Subject To Cognitive, Environmental, And Communication Workload Stressors Present In Fully Activated Emergency Operations Centers, Samiullah Durrani

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The diversity and dynamic nature of disaster management environments necessitate the use of convenient, yet reliable, tools for technology. While there have been many improvements in mitigating the effects of disasters, it is clearly evident by recent events, such as Hurricane Katrina that issues related to emergency response and management require considerable research and improvement to effectively respond to these situations. One of the links in a disaster management chain is the Emergency Operations Center (EOC). The EOC is a physical command center responsible for the overall strategic control of the disaster response and functions as an information and communication …

Optimization Of Lifeguard Towers, Equipment, And Sign Placement With Human Factors Considerations For The Cal Poly Recreation Center Expansion, Brian J. Henrikson

Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering

Cal Poly’s Recreation Center serves many faculty, students and alumni by providing them with a safe and fun environment to work out and swim. An overwhelming majority of students voted for a Recreation Center expansion to handle the increased usage of the Center over the past few years. The focus of this report is the safe and effective operations of the pool deck and the lifeguard staff. Three surveys were created to see what the lifeguard staff, as well as pool users, thought about the current pool deck and what they would like to see in the new pool deck …

Improving Business Performance Through The Integration Of Human Factors Engineering Into Organizations Using A Systems Engineeri, Monica Philippart

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Most organizations today understand the valuable contribution employees as people (rather than simply bodies) provide to their overall performance. Although efforts are made to make the most of the human in organizations, there is still much room for improvement. Focus in the reduction of employee injuries such as cumulative trauma disorders rose in the 80 s. Attempts at increasing performance by addressing employee satisfaction through various methods have also been ongoing for several years now. Knowledge Management is one of the most recent attempts at controlling and making the best use of employees knowledge. All of these efforts and more …