Book Review

Human factors have come centre stage. After many years when engineers have regarded human factors as soft, and an optional extra, and when software engineers and artificial intelligence researchers alike have seen the human factors community as incoherent and poorly organised, there is a new urgency. This new book, by Thomas B. Sheridan of MIT, was written for the Human Factors and Engineering Society, based on extensive research by the author, and a comprehensive review of the state of the art. Summarising the history of the field, Sheridan traces the development from ‘knobs and dials’, to ‘borrowed engineering models’, and now to ‘human– computer interaction’. His personal involvement dates from Skinner’s laboratory at Harvard half a century ago, and he brings a background in engineering and applied psychology. The book is authoritative, well referenced, illustrated and comprehensible to non-specialists. It provides a rich resource for students and professionals. The starting point of the book is technology driven, and there are numerous examples, but the human focus is pronounced. Quantitative modelling is criticised as ‘sorcery for the powerful’. There are telling arguments concerning trust: ‘System designers should be concerned about misuse, disuse and abuse of automation, based on distrust and overtrust as well as workload and other factors.’ The final three pages concerned with education, before the detailed appendices which include some more technical material, express heartfelt cautionary conclusions: ‘Automation has wonderful benefits, but when applied carelessly, it can lead to complexity, unpredictability, and alienation in many forms. The public needs to understand that automation is not all or none, and that the reality is almost always a human–automation interaction of some sort.’ The book gained added urgency, just before going to press, from the attacks on New York and Washington. Reflecting on the events of 11 September 2001, the author remarks: ‘the problems of humans and automation have become more important than ever. Indeed, we need improved automation for our security and well-being as a society, yet we realise how vulnerable are our various large-scale aggregations of humans and automatic equipment (transportation, communication, buildings, supply of food, water, electricity etc.) to terrorist acts.’