Chapter - 3

HUMAN PERFORMANCE & LIMITATIONS

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 INTRODUCTION
 Aviation system is considered to be an ultra-safe system
 Each and every individual of it forms part of the system
 Human being is the central component of the working
environment/ system.
 But as a human being, he has abilities and limitations that
can have a direct bearing on the total safety of the system.
 His performance depends on some physical and mental
characteristics

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 INTRODUCTION
• The Key physical and mental human performance
characteristics which are likely to affect a person in his
working environment are:

• Vision,
• Hearing,
• Information processing,
• Attention and perception,
• Memory,
• Judgment,
• Decision making.

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 INTRODUCTION
• Besides, as a Liveware, a human being is in the centre of the
SHELL model, so other components in the working
environment must be properly matched with him to avoid
‘stress’ and eventual breakdown.

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 INTRODUCTION
• To achieve this proper matching, understanding of the
characteristics of liveware (physical and mental) are essential.
As a human being, the liveware has:
• Physical characteristics: Size/shape, body movement, strength
• Physical needs: Biological
• Input system: Data acquisition system
• Information (data) processing system: Brain function
• Output system: Action
• Environmental tolerances: Reaction to external conditions

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HUMAN IN HF MODEL
Physical size, shape, strength:
 In the design of workplace and equipment, consideration
must be given to body measurements, movements, force
etc. (important for ergonomic workplace design)
 Vary according to factors such as age, ethnicity (related
with religion) and gender.

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HUMAN IN HF MODEL
Physical needs:
 Hunger and eating, tiredness, sleep, rest
 Physiology and biology provides background knowledge
on human physical needs

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HUMAN IN HF MODEL
Input characteristics:
 Human has sensory systems for collecting information and
enabling them to respond to events and to carry out the
required task.
 Physiology and Psychology provides background knowledge
on this.

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HUMAN IN HF MODEL
Information processing:
 This is human brain function
 Limitations in this activity accounts a lot for the capabilities
and limitations of the human in the working environment.
 Involving factors: Short- and long-term memory, stress,
motivation etc.
 Psychology and cognitive sciences are the sources of
background knowledge on human information processing

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HUMAN IN HF MODEL
Output characteristics:
 After information being sensed, processed and decisions made,
messages are sent to muscles to initiate the desired response
(output).
 Responses: Any activity like physical control movement or
establish some form of communication etc
 Biomechanics, physiology, psychology etc provide the
background knowledge on human output characteristics.

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HUMAN IN HF MODEL
Environmental tolerances:
 Environmental factors: Temperature, vibration, pressure,
humidity, noise, time of day, amount of light and G-forces,
heights, enclosed spaces, a boring or stressful work
environment
 Can affect human performance and well-being, can influence
human behaviour and performance.
 Study of medicine, psychology, physiology and biology
provide background information.

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VISION
 Our normal vision has many more limitations that affect our
performance than we usually realize.
 In this perspective, following points are important:
• Distinguish between good and bad visual clues
• Physiology and anatomy of human eye.

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 Visual Discrimination
• Primarily, displays provide the operator with information
about the status of the equipment or situation.

• In a working environment a person is often required to interpret

a number of different visual displays.

• Four distinct types of displays are commonly encountered in

the working environment:
 Check displays
 Qualitative as in quality displays
 Quantitative as in quantity displays, and
 Labels, instructions and warnings.

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 Visual Discrimination / Check Display
• Check displays indicate whether a given condition exists:
 Examples:
• Green Light : Normal functioning

• Red or yellow : Faulty/abnormal

Traffic lights are a classic example. You don't need to take time
to think that you have to stop if the traffic light is red, you just
stop because it is red. The same is true of operating machinery.
Operators will invariably check that they have power to the
machinery through a status light that will show red for off and
green for on or no light if the power isn't applied and a steady
light if it is.

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 Visual Discrimination / Qualitative Display
 Qualitative Displays: Provide the opportunity for the reader to
see at a glance what is happening. It indicate the status of a
variable e.g In hydraulic system a pointer within a normal
range. (It check either full or empty).
For example, if your car's petrol gauge is in the red, you
probably don't need to know exactly how much petrol is there, but
you do know that you need to get to the petrol station fairly
quickly.

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 Visual Discrimination / Quantitative Display
 Quantitative Information : Reflects the quantitative value of
some variables such as temperature, speed, diameter of a
cylinder etc.
 Quantitative Displays: Show exact value of the information e.g
temperature in a temperature gage is 100 C.

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 Visual Discrimination / Label, Instruction & Warning
 Labels, Instructions and Warnings are special displays that are
used to provide
 Specific information for a specific case and
 Also with some additional information which is “what is
normally available.”
 Example: Danger Sign

Danger – Specific Information

1100 KVA- Additional Information

 Examples: “DO NOT ENTER”, “WRONG WAY”

placards/signposts etc.

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 Visual Discrimination / Effective Display
 Different visual cues are used for “Effective Displays”
 There are a number of standards or norms that most of these
types of displays adhere to. Common norms include red for
stop or danger, green for go or good, and a red bar across an
item to show that it is not wanted or is prohibited from a
particular area.
 Some of the considerations for effective displays are as
follows:

• Colour : Red, Green, Purple

• Light/Dark : Light purple, Dark Purple
• Contrast : Red/Green, Blue/Yellow, Black/White
• Legibility and typography : Font size /type

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Factors Affecting Clarity of Sight
 The eye is very sensitive in the right conditions (e.g. clear
air, good light, etc.).
 Eye is about 24 times more sensitive than the ear.

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Factors Affecting Clarity of Sight
 Visual acuity is the ability of the eye to discriminate sharp
detail at varying distances.
 An individual with acuity of 20/20 vision should be able
to see at 20 feet that which the so-called ‘normal ’ person
is capable of seeing at this range.
 It may be expressed in meters as 6/6 vision.
 The figures 20/40 mean that the observer can read at 20
feet what a ‘normal ’ person can read at 40 feet.

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Factors Affecting Clarity of Sight
Various factors can affect and limit the visual acuity of the
eye. These include:

 Physical factors:
 physical imperfections in one or both eyes (short
sightedness, long sightedness),
 Imperfection due to aging. – presbiopia
 Fatigue

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Factors Affecting Clarity of Sight
The influence of ingested foreign substances:
 drugs,
 medication,
 alcohol,
 cigarettes

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Factors Affecting Clarity of Sight
 Environmental factors :
 amount of light available,
 clarity of the air (e.g. dust, mist, rain, etc.).

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Factors Affecting Clarity of Sight
 Factors associated with object being viewed:
 size and contours of the object,
 contrast of the object with its surroundings,
 relative motion of the object,
 distance of the object from the viewer,
 the angle of the object from the viewer.

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HEARING

 Hearing or auditory system is one of the most important system

of a human.
 The ear performs two quite different functions.
 Detect sounds by receiving vibrations in the air,
 Responsible for balance and sensing acceleration.

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Performance and Limitation of Ear
 The performance of the ear is associated with the range of
sounds that can be heard -both in terms of the pitch
(frequency) and the volume (intensity) of the sound.
 The audible frequency range that a young person can hear
is typically between 20 and 20,000 cycles per second (or
Hertz), with greatest sensitivity at about 3000 Hz.
 Volume (or intensity) of sound is measured in decibels
(dB).

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Impact of Noise on Performance
Q. What is noise?
-Unwanted sound.
Noise have various negative effects in the workplace
It can-
 be annoying (irritating) (e.g. sudden sounds, constant loud
sound, etc.);
 interfere with verbal communication between individuals in the
workplace;
 cause accidents by masking warning signals or messages;
 be fatiguing and affect concentration, decision making, etc.;
 damage workers ’ hearing (either temporarily or permanently).

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Impact of Noise on Performance
 Intermittent and sudden noise are generally considered to
be more disruptive than continuous noise at the same
level.
 High frequency noise generally has a more adverse affect
on performance than lower frequency.
 Noise tends to increase errors and variability, rather than
directly affect work rate.

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Listening Process

 Hearing is a passive process which theoretically just

involves the mechanics of the sensation caused by noise in
the vicinity of the human ear.
 Listening, requires the full information processing
activity. We have to attend to what is heard by the senses
and place it into the short term or working memory for
consideration.

Q. What is the difference between hearing and listening?

Hearing- Number of words that come into our ear

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Listening Process
Listening involves selecting, attending, understanding and
responding.
 (i) Selecting - we select what we want to listen to
from all the sounds around us.
 (ii) Attending - we must pay attention to the sound.
 (iii) Understanding - this is the process of assigning
meaning to the sound.
 (iv) Responding- a response may be remembering what
you have heard or it may be taking action.

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Active Listening Process
 To listen properly we must engage in what we call active
listening. For active listening, it is needed for an
individual to:

 Get prepared by thinking about the topic being discussed;

 Stay involved by focussing in what the speaker is saying,
not on what you want to say;
 Keep an open mind about the subject and in particular be
willing to accept alternative views to your own;
 Review and evaluate by putting the information into
different words that provide the same meaning; and,
 Give feedback through appropriate responses.

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Barriers to active listening

 Too much information;

 Boring subject;
 Concentrating on your own views;
 Being easily distracted by other influences;
 criticizing the delivery rather than the content.

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Information Processing
 Information processing is the process of receiving
information through the senses, analysing it and making it
meaningful.

 As people interact with their environment, sesnses are

used in acquiring information that are subsequently
processed and applied.

 We have five senses. Some people claim a sixth sense

which is intuition (perception) and there is no doubt
many people have some intuition.

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  The five senses are:

 Sight: through the visual system using our eyes as the

primary sensor.
 Hearing: through the auditory system using our ears
 Touch: feel through the skin are said to use the
integument (external)
 Taste: is sensed via the gustatory system using the
tongue as the primary source of sense.
 Smell: is though our noses using the olfactory system.

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Decision Making
 Having recognised coherent (intelligible/clear) information
from the stimuli reaching our senses, a course of action has to
be decided upon. In other words decision making occurs.

 Decision making is the generation of alternative courses of

action based on available information, knowledge, prior
experience, expectation, context (situation), goals, etc and
selecting one preferred option. It is also described as thinking,
problem solving and judgement.

 This may range from deciding to do nothing, to deciding to act

immediately in a very specific manner.

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Physical Access and Claustrophobia
 There are many circumstances where people may
experience various levels of physical or psychological
discomfort when in an enclosed or small space, which is
generally considered to be quite normal. When this
discomfort becomes extreme, it is known as
claustrophobia .

 Claustrophobia can be defined as abnormal fear of being

in an enclosed space.

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Fear of Heights
 Working at significant heights can also be a problem for
some one. Some one may be quite at ease in situations like
these whereas others may be so uncomfortable that they
are far more concerned about the height, and holding on to
the access equipment, than they are about the job in hand.
In such situations, it is very important that appropriate use
is made of harnesses and safety ropes.

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Questions

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