Automated assistance for human factors analysis in complex systems A. GREGORIADES & A. G. SUTCLIFFE Centre for HCI Design, School of Informatics University of Manchester, P.O.Box 88, Manchester, M60 1QD, UK ags@manchester.ac.uk Keywords: Socio-technical systems design; Human performance; Workload assessment; Functional allocation. This paper describes a tool and method for scenario-based workload assessment and performance validation in complex socio-technical systems design, such as command and control rooms of military vessels. We assess workload in terms of communication and the task load that each agent is able to handle. The method employs subjective task and communication estimates used to calculate the workload of human operators, using static and scenario-based analyses. This enables the identifications of bottlenecks to be addressed by the designer with the appropriate allocation of function between humans and smart technology. This task is supported by the functional allocation advisor tool. A case study is presented that demonstrates the use of the tool for the design of the command and control room (C2) of a military vessel. 1. Introduction In complex socio-technical systems such as military command and control rooms, human agents are faced with a variety of threats that impose periods of high and low workload. An early workload assessment of air traffic controllers (Stein 1985) identified the need for workload prediction to assist planning and staffing of air traffic control rooms. According to Rouse (Rouse et al. 1993), workload is defined as the demand placed upon people which may be a behavioural response to events, communication and interaction between the humans and technology. Hart and Wickens (1990) portray workload as the cost of accomplishing task requirements for the human element of socio-technical systems. High levels of workload degrade the operator’s concentration, information processing and decision making, leading to increased errors which might have catastrophic effects (Reason 1990, Leveson 1995). However, low workload can also be pathological since it causes boredom and can result in a deterioration of performance (Hollnagel & Bye 2000).