Human Factors and Ergonomics

Approximately 7 million workers in the United States work in jobs that primarily require lifting, lowering, and moving materials. This type of worker has the highest rates of injury among professions monitored by the US Bureau of Labor and Statistics. Injuries can either be caused by acute accidents, or over time by repetition and overuse. Regardless of the cause, these injuries are often debilitating for the worker and costly for the employer. Robotic automation has been increasingly used to replace workers, but these robots are expensive to purchase and require...

This presentation will explore some of the machine learning and natural language processing approaches for analyzing noisy injury narratives collected from hospital emergency rooms and for identifying emerging product injuries from online data sources. Learners will also discuss how vision-based machine learning systems can be used for detection of personal protective equipment (PPE) compliance for safety glasses.

This 8-week, asynchronous online course presents fundamental concepts from multiple disciplines that are essential to understanding and implementing macroergonomics principles. The course begins with introducing core topics from systems theory, socio-technical systems approach, organizational behavior and design, participatory ergonomics, and implementing integrated organizational interventions. The class continues with an exploration of various case studies where macroergonomics interventions occurred along with recognizing successful factors in designing and implementing organizational...

This 8-week, asynchronous online course will focus on the role of Human Factors & Ergonomics (HF/Ergo) in the design of occupational tasks and consumer products. The course starts with an introduction to human-centered design concepts and the design process, followed by an overview of human capacity including a detailed examination of anthropometry, as this is essential for human-centered design. Next, we cover the use of engineering design optimization methods such as motion capture, force measurement and digital human modeling and simulation software, and the use of validated...