ABSTRACT
So far, the main concern of this book was a process-oriented discussion of reaction processes and attention. In this chapter, the perspective is task oriented, which means a focus on applied procedures in assessing human performance in real-life tasks, existing ones as well as those in the design phase. Real-life tasks are highly diverse and vary widely in nature and complexity. Some common elements notwithstanding, they are dominated by domain-specific features that require specialized expertise of a human-factors specialist. Examples include driving, flying, maneuvering a ship, supervising a nuclear or chemical control room, handling a text-processing system, carrying out a medical operation, and drilling teeth. Aside from questions about enhancing expert performance through better designs, there are human-factors issues with respect to training and instruction. The main question, then, is to what extent such specialized areas may benefit from evidence from small paradigms. What is the validity of the applied guidelines, as outlined in the previous chapters, for complex tasks? Is theory of any value? Is there actually any need for guidelines from basic research when designing a complex system?
