ABSTRACT
This chapter presents observations concerning human factors (HF) contribution to design that derive from the author’s involvement in HF education and practice over fifteen years. HF practitioners have continued to be unable to contribute effectively to product and system design. A working knowledge of engineering and computing would be critical to a HF practitioner involved in accident reconstruction and simulation, and in user interface design and prototyping. A case in point is anthropometric design, in which data are tabulated with standard deviations for specific population percentiles corresponding to notional users. Historically, HF practitioners have also gained an unflattering reputation of being concerned only with problem diagnosis, and for being too vague in their design recommendations. The limit in accuracy justifiable in the specified value becomes clearer if one were to also consider the effect of notional design allowances and the variety of slump and seated postures adopted by users.
