UAS Human Factors

            Human factors are a multi-faceted issue that is faced by machines such as cars, aircraft, ships, etc.  Unmanned aerial systems are no exception, and in many ways suffer from some of the toughest human factors challenges.  According to Howe (2017), “human factors is the multidisciplinary study of human capabilities and limitations…applied to equipment, systems, facilities, procedures, jobs, environments, training, staffing, and personnel management…for safe, comfortable, and effective human performance.”  Translation: human factors is the study of how man and machine work together and how to improve the way a human’s interface with the machine to operate it safely and effectively.

            One of the biggest areas of study for human is how automation can be utilized to improve the working relationship between the human and the machine.  There are many ways that automation can increase safety, such as reducing workload and thus decreasing stress and fatigue, increasing an operator’s ability to monitor and think about what they are doing, which in turn increases safety and reduces the chances of human error occurring.  Of course, these benefits do not come without concerns.  Automation, if used improperly, can lead to complacency and over-reliance as well as misleading indications or warning in the event of malfunctions (Howe, 2017).  One of the other main human factor challenges that unmanned system face is the separation of the operator from the vehicle they are controlling.  This leads to the loss of most sensory cues, generally only leaving visual cues for operators to rely on.  There are solutions to this challenge by using haptic feedback systems and auditory cues, but many unmanned systems have yet to incorporate them into their designs (Landry, 2017).

            These challenges prevent a unique but very interesting hurdle for unmanned systems to overcome.  The bottom line is that human factors design is a balancing act of information.  To much information and the operator could become task saturated and overwhelmed leading to mistakes or things being missed.  To little information (or to much automation) and operators could be uninformed about what their system is doing which could lead to becoming complacent or unaware of malfunctions that are occurring.

References

Howe, S. (2017, June). The Leading Human Factors Deficiencies in Unmanned Aircraft Systems. Retrieved from https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20170005590.pdf

Landry, S. J. (Ed.). (2017). Handbook of human factors in air transportation systems. Retrieved from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com