An investigation of the role of a work analysis in the design of automation in railway systems
(2016) FLMU06 20152Division of Risk Management and Societal Safety
- Abstract
- The past decades has seen automation rapidly increasing in the railway industry, with the "perceived" motivations of faster services, economy, safety, and energy efficiency. However these motivations often obscures the fact that automation also create new burdens and complexities for the operators and maintainers (Bainbridge, 1983; Woods, 1996). Joint Cognitive Systems (JCS) (Woods & Hollnagel, 2006) was derived to address the challenges faced with complex systems.
Several studies have shown the benefits of applying JCS thinking in various industries (Boy & Schmitt, 2013; Effken, Kim, & Shaw, 1997; Hall, Shattuck, & Bennett, 2012; Militello, Dominguez, Lintern, & Klein, 2009), and it is therefore of interested to investigate the... (More) - The past decades has seen automation rapidly increasing in the railway industry, with the "perceived" motivations of faster services, economy, safety, and energy efficiency. However these motivations often obscures the fact that automation also create new burdens and complexities for the operators and maintainers (Bainbridge, 1983; Woods, 1996). Joint Cognitive Systems (JCS) (Woods & Hollnagel, 2006) was derived to address the challenges faced with complex systems.
Several studies have shown the benefits of applying JCS thinking in various industries (Boy & Schmitt, 2013; Effken, Kim, & Shaw, 1997; Hall, Shattuck, & Bennett, 2012; Militello, Dominguez, Lintern, & Klein, 2009), and it is therefore of interested to investigate the practicalities of applying JCS theory in the railway industry.
Underpinning the JCS approach, is the need to study and analyse the work domain (i.e. the field of practice) to provide a functional description of the objectives, goals, and constraints of a work domain that can be used to define the work strategies and associated cognitive and collaborative challenges.
This thesis investigates what the role of a work analysis is within the context of JCS design. Two qualitative case studies were undertaken to investigate the role of a work analysis for the design of automation in railway systems. Although the results highlighted that understanding 'work as done' is critical to the design of a JCS, there were also various deficiencies, challenges and inconsistencies identified with using the outcomes of the work analysis that could hinder the success of a JCS. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/8518194
- author
- Becht, Holger LU
- supervisor
- organization
- course
- FLMU06 20152
- year
- 2016
- type
- H1 - Master's Degree (One Year)
- subject
- keywords
- FLMU06, system safety, human factors, automation, Joint cognitive systems, work domain analysis
- language
- English
- id
- 8518194
- date added to LUP
- 2016-01-12 14:36:08
- date last changed
- 2016-01-13 15:13:42
@misc{8518194, abstract = {{The past decades has seen automation rapidly increasing in the railway industry, with the "perceived" motivations of faster services, economy, safety, and energy efficiency. However these motivations often obscures the fact that automation also create new burdens and complexities for the operators and maintainers (Bainbridge, 1983; Woods, 1996). Joint Cognitive Systems (JCS) (Woods & Hollnagel, 2006) was derived to address the challenges faced with complex systems. Several studies have shown the benefits of applying JCS thinking in various industries (Boy & Schmitt, 2013; Effken, Kim, & Shaw, 1997; Hall, Shattuck, & Bennett, 2012; Militello, Dominguez, Lintern, & Klein, 2009), and it is therefore of interested to investigate the practicalities of applying JCS theory in the railway industry. Underpinning the JCS approach, is the need to study and analyse the work domain (i.e. the field of practice) to provide a functional description of the objectives, goals, and constraints of a work domain that can be used to define the work strategies and associated cognitive and collaborative challenges. This thesis investigates what the role of a work analysis is within the context of JCS design. Two qualitative case studies were undertaken to investigate the role of a work analysis for the design of automation in railway systems. Although the results highlighted that understanding 'work as done' is critical to the design of a JCS, there were also various deficiencies, challenges and inconsistencies identified with using the outcomes of the work analysis that could hinder the success of a JCS.}}, author = {{Becht, Holger}}, language = {{eng}}, note = {{Student Paper}}, title = {{An investigation of the role of a work analysis in the design of automation in railway systems}}, year = {{2016}}, }