MEC8028 : Human Centered Design and Engineering
- Offered for Year: 2023/24
- Module Leader(s): Dr David Golightly
- Lecturer: Professor Roberto Palacin
- Owning School: Engineering
- Teaching Location: Newcastle City Campus
Semesters
Your programme is made up of credits, the total differs on programme to programme.
Semester 2 Credit Value: | 20 |
ECTS Credits: | 10.0 |
European Credit Transfer System |
Aims
* To provide a comprehensive overview of the rationale, benefits and principles of human factors.
* To cover the major themes of human factors including physical factors, cognitive factors and organisational
factors.
* To present multiple design implications, considerations and methodologies that can be followed when designing
for a wide variety of people and applications.
* To present and discuss different scenarios where human factors considerations play a crucial role such as in
system safety, in human-automation cooperation and in delivering high levels of performance and system
resilience in domains such as transport, manufacturing and healthcare.
* To inform and provide a contemporary knowledge base on current trends and proven methods that support
designing for humans in any engineering design context.
Outline Of Syllabus
* Human factors: origins, rationale and benefits
* Systems perspectives on human performance
* Physical, cognitive and organisational aspects of human factors
* Human-computer interaction relevant to engineering and engineered systems
* Design for all, accessibility and EDI
* Obtaining, Capturing, measuring and use of anthropometric data to inform design
* Cognitive methodology for workload, situation awareness and human-computer interaction / User Experience
* Human-automation integration, for machine intelligence and for robotics
* Human role in safety, including human perspectives on accidents and incidents
* Complex work systems - describing complexity for human integration into engineered systems
* Applied Ergonomics: Industrial and consumer ergonomics / Transport ergonomics and user-base design issues
* Data gathering and project management
Teaching Methods
Teaching Activities
Category | Activity | Number | Length | Student Hours | Comment |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Scheduled Learning And Teaching Activities | Lecture | 6 | 1:00 | 6:00 | 2-weekly lectures |
Structured Guided Learning | Lecture materials | 1 | 6:00 | 6:00 | Independent working time from topic briefing to practical submission |
Guided Independent Study | Assessment preparation and completion | 1 | 2:00 | 2:00 | CANVAS based timed assessment |
Structured Guided Learning | Academic skills activities | 4 | 9:00 | 36:00 | Off-line Canvas reading materials and non sync exercises |
Scheduled Learning And Teaching Activities | Practical | 4 | 3:00 | 12:00 | Weekly PiP Labs: 1)UCD, Displays design, 2)Anthropometry 1+2, 3)Transport ergonomics |
Guided Independent Study | Skills practice | 3 | 4:00 | 12:00 | Necessary for the weekly task submissions |
Structured Guided Learning | Structured research and reading activities | 2 | 5:00 | 10:00 | Canvas reading lists for project support |
Guided Independent Study | Project work | 3 | 12:00 | 36:00 | Independent study hours expected for project work |
Guided Independent Study | Project work | 4 | 9:00 | 36:00 | Project self -study hours available via CANVAS activities |
Scheduled Learning And Teaching Activities | Drop-in/surgery | 3 | 1:00 | 3:00 | 1 weekly drop-in surgery |
Guided Independent Study | Independent study | 20 | 2:00 | 40:00 | Revision of Lecture material, practical self-study and additional reading for Exam |
Scheduled Learning And Teaching Activities | Module talk | 1 | 1:00 | 1:00 | Module briefing |
Total | 200:00 |
Teaching Rationale And Relationship
Lectures are intended to promote an appreciation of the various implications of ‘designing for humans’ and developing set of skills that can be applied to topical issues and case studies in design and ergonomics.
Group-projects, where students identify the most critical knowledge and information relevant to a pre-assigned case and apply it to develop specific solutions within the engineering design and ergonomics space.
Practicals, where students are given specific contents to review ‘online’ which are then solved and reinforced in a group-based session with a member of staff acting as facilitator.
Assessment Methods
The format of resits will be determined by the Board of Examiners
Exams
Description | Length | Semester | When Set | Percentage | Comment |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Digital Examination | 120 | 2 | A | 50 | Exam covering all elements of the syllabus |
Other Assessment
Description | Semester | When Set | Percentage | Comment |
---|---|---|---|---|
Practical/lab report | 2 | M | 50 | A portfolio of practical submissions |
Formative Assessments
Formative Assessment is an assessment which develops your skills in being assessed, allows for you to receive feedback, and prepares you for being assessed. However, it does not count to your final mark.
Description | Semester | When Set | Comment |
---|---|---|---|
Digital Examination | 2 | M | Canvas quiz on Human Factors fundamentals. End of Week 26 (Module Week 1) |
Assessment Rationale And Relationship
*The examination is used to assess knowledge, independent learning and understanding of material and the ability to integrate this material, to communicate it clearly, and to demonstrate critical thinking in relation to a short case example in engineering, design or operations.
*The Group-based practical Lab report allows for discussion of options and group justification of the selected case studies, methodologies and results. The assessment will involve producing one singe Team report following a template discussed in class.
The team will use a peer-evaluation system to distribute the final marks according to their performance.
For the purposes of professional body accreditation, in order to obtain a passing mark overall for this module (50%) at the first attempt the minimum acceptable mark for each of the assessment items specified below shall be 35%, with the maximum possible module overall mark where this is not the case being restricted to 40%: (1) 50% Exam (2) 50% Assignments (Combined)
Reading Lists
Timetable
- Timetable Website: www.ncl.ac.uk/timetable/
- MEC8028's Timetable