Why person models are important for human factors science

Human factors science has always been concerned with explaining and preventing human error and accidents. In the past 100 years, the field has shifted focus from a person approach to a system approach. In this opinion article, I provide five reasons why this shift is not opportune, and why person models are important for human factors science. I...

Controversy in human factors constructs and the explosive use of the NASA-TLX: A measurement perspective

Situation awareness and workload are popular constructs in human factors science. It has been hotly debated whether these constructs are scientifically credible, or whether they should merely be seen as folk models. Reflecting on the works of psychophysicist Stanley Smith Stevens and of measurement theorist David Hand, we suggest a resolution to...

Vertical field of view restriction in driver training: A simulator-based evaluation

The young driver problem requires remedial measures against speeding and overconfidence. Previous research has shown that increasing the task difficulty during training can enhance subsequent retention performance and prevent overconfidence. In this driving simulator study, we evaluated the training effectiveness of vertical field of view...

Social desirability is the same in offline, online, and paper surveys: A meta-analysis

The aim of this meta-analysis was to compare social desirability scores between paper and computer surveys. Subgroup analyses were conducted with Internet connectivity, level of anonymity, individual or group test setting, possibility of skipping items, possibility of backtracking previous items, inclusion of questions of sensitive nature, and...

Photovoltaic technology selection: A fuzzy MCDM approach

This paper focuses on standards battles for photovoltaic technological systems. Five photovoltaic technologies are currently commercially available and it is still unclear which of these technologies will emerge as the dominant design. Based on the literature and on expert interviews, we develop and analyze categories and factors for technology...

The expansion of Google Scholar versus Web of Science: a longitudinal study

Web of Science (WoS) and Google Scholar (GS) are prominent citation services with distinct indexing mechanisms. Comprehensive knowledge about the growth patterns of these two citation services is lacking. We analyzed the development of citation counts in WoS and GS for two classic articles and 56 articles from diverse research fields, making a...

Small sample sizes, overextraction, and unrealistic expectations: A commentary on M. Mattsson

In a recent article about the Manchester Driver Behaviour Questionnaire (DBQ), Mattsson (2012) concluded that the factor structure was not invariant across subgroups of respondents. This commentary contests this conclusion.

Using the Student’s t-test with extremely small sample sizes

Researchers occasionally have to work with an extremely small sample size, defined herein as N ≤ 5. Some methodologists have cautioned against using the t-test when the sample size is extremely small, whereas others have suggested that using the t-test is feasible in such a case. The present simulation study estimated the Type I error rate and...

Predicting self-reported violations among novice license drivers using pre-license simulator measures

Novice drivers are overrepresented in crash statistics and there is a clear need for remedial measures. Driving simulators allow for controlled and objective measurement of behavior and might therefore be a useful tool for predicting whether someone will commit deviant driving behaviors on the roads. However, little is currently known about the...

Enhancing driver car-following performance with a distance and acceleration display

A car-following assisting system named the rear window notification display (RWND) was developed, with the aim of improving a driver's manual car-following performance. The RWND presented lead-car acceleration and time headway (THW) (i.e., intervehicle distance divided by the speed of the following car) on the rear window of a lead car, which...

Five-point Likert items: t test versus Mann-Whitney-Wilcoxon

Likert questionnaires are widely used in survey research, but it is unclear whether the item data should be investigated by means of parametric or nonparametric procedures. This study compared the Type I and II error rates of the t test versus the Mann-Whitney-Wilcoxon (MWW) for five-point Likert items. Fourteen population distributions were...