Topic 1: Human factors and ergonomics

1.1a Anthropometrics

Designers consider three human factors to ensure products meet ergonomic needs.

- Design is human centred —— therefore designers need to ensure the products are in
the right size and comfortable
- Designers need to consider how users will interact with the product or service
- An important consideration: use and misuse
- Anthropometric data sets can vary significantly between populations.

Ergonomic data and measurements

Anthropometric data
- Measurements of the human body (height, weight, arm length, etc.)
- Can come in various forms, population groups, quality and sample size
- Should choose a best suited dataset

Primary data
- Data about the specific target audience that is gathered first hand by designer
- Can also be considered survey data
- Tends to consist of a relatively small numbers of samples

Secondary data
- Comes from datasets produced by government agencies/research groups
- Have a relatively large sample size

Two types of measurements for anthropometric data:

1. Static measurements - Measurements of length between points on a body
2. Dynamic measurements - Measurements of reach, movement, or strength.
- Use to determine how a person moves in a space/how much force is
required to complete an action

Reach
- Normal reach
- A distance a user could comfortably extend their arm
- a distance where objects or controls are comfortable and easy to reach with
minimal physical stress, and where they can be accessed easily and
repeatedly
- Maximal reach
- The maximum distance a user can extend their arm
- accessible, but would require some effort and not be ideal for repetitive or
frequent actions
Percentiles and percentile ranges
- Designers need to determine which percentiles their product will serve
 to determine the specifications, such as physical size, or how much force
required to operate

- Need to collect primary and secondary data

to determine which range of users they need to design for

- Percentile
a. used in statistics to show the value below which a certain percentage of a
group falls.

- The design context is important

Factors that influence the anthropometric measurements

- Age, gender, ethnicity
- Carefully consider the source of datasets and whether they are applicable to the
design context

Using anthropometric measurements

1. Decide who you are designing for
- Identify the user population (adults, women, etc.)
2. Decide which measurements are relevant
- Identify the static and dynamic measurements that will be necessary for you
to consider your design (height, reach, etc.)
3. Decide what percentile you need to design for
- Select the relevant data to guide your design specifications (average users or
extremes?)
1.1b Psychological Factors

Designers consider three human factors to ensure products meet ergonomic needs.

Scales of measurement
The collecting of psychological data involves the study of human behaviour and responses.

Nominal Scale
- Used for labelling a variable
- E.g. checkboxes for characteristics
- The items in the list have no real numerical value or relationship to one another.

Ordinal Scale
- List items in order of importance or significance
- Usually measure a feeling or perception along a continuum (unhappy to happy;
unsatisfied to satisfied)
- No numerical difference between on value and the text

Interval Scale
- Represent the order of values as well as showing the difference
- E.g. a Celsius thermometer
- Do not have an absolute zero (the zero of Celsius thermometer is set to the freezing
point of water)

Ratio Scale
- The most comprehensive scale
- In some way the perfect combination of other scales
- They show the exact difference between units and the order of units, and have
absolute zero
- Provide the most comprehensive form of quantitative data for analysis and research

Why do designers need to know about the different scales?

To help evaluate the effectiveness of your data gathering methodology

- What kind of data are you gathering? Quantitative or Qualitative?

- What type of scale are you using to gather this data? Ratio, ordinal, interval, or
nominal
- What tools are you using to gather the data? Surveys, measuring tools like rules or
scales, observation, stop watches, interviews?

Your survey should gather meaningful data.

Types of survey questions to gather meaningful primary research

- Closed questions
- Open questions
- Multiple choice questions
- Likert scale questions
1.1c Physiological Factors
Planning Ergonomic Research