Has Human Factors Come of Age?

Abstract

A number of critical factors in the past, present, and future of the human factors field are evaluated. By many criteria human factors is efflorescent. However, probing beneath the surface and taking a longer-range and more systemic view suggests conditions of morbidity that, if unheeded, may lead to the demise of human factors as a separate entity. In order for human factors to be viable and useful in the future, theory building must be advanced which is explanatory of the interactions among people and machines (or technologies) in environments. Human factors must brake the momentum generated by existing institutional settings and overreliance on the experimental psychology (laboratory) model. A number of possible new liaisons with other fields and means of anticipating the future are identified. A number of specific research questions, deemed important to human factors expansion and realworld usefulness, are posed.