ABSTRACT
Human centered design requires that designers and analysts apply human factors analyses to real world contexts. However, the outputs of most human factors methods are abstract representations and their relation to the real world context remains absent or implicit, forcing the analyst to infer a link. A review of those Human Factors methods that have some element of space and time in the representation of their outcomes could potentially make the link between abstract outcomes and real world contexts explicit. The aim of this paper was to explore the ability of these selected methods for representing analyses of road user behavior in real world driving contexts. The methods were applied to right hand turns at intersections and the outputs were mapped onto an intersection schematic. The results highlighted strengths and weaknesses of each method and showed that link analysis and network analysis-based methodologies were best able to represent the complexity and interaction of the example task best. It is concluded that these are the most promising approaches for linking abstract outcomes and real world representations of Human Factors analysis when studying complex sociotechnical systems.
