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Gamification is defined as applying game design elements to non‐game contexts. The integration of gamification into the workplace adds a stimulating and captivating game‐like layer to the working experience of employees. This is predicted to improve their positive affect at work and operational performance to a certain extent. With the ubiquity of smartphones and Internet technology, smartphone‐based interactive operations can better facilitate the implementation of gamification in work processes. Against a backdrop of a drastic transformation facing the Chinese equipment manufacturing industry, we gamified a number of  computer numerical control machine operational jobs. A gamified job design framework was proposed, based on the job characteristics model and the game elements hierarchy. To achieve gamification in this context, a smartphone application was designed. We then hypothesized that smartphone‐based gamified job design (SGJD) would enhance participants’ three key indicators, namely, (i) job motivation, (ii) job satisfaction, and (iii) operational performance. We also analyzed how participants’ willingness to embrace gamified job design, known as “consent,” affected the improvement in the three key indicators. The results illustrated that SGJD significantly increased participants’ job motivation, job satisfaction, and operational performance. Furthermore, our experiment showed that consent to SGJD was positively correlated to the improvement in job motivation. However, no significant correlation was observed between consent to SGJD and an improvement in job satisfaction or operational performance.

There is certainly room for economy‐class travelers to make their trips more pleasant. A travel pillow might improve comfort. In this study, the comfort expectations and experience of travel pillows were examined. Comparing these 2 aspects indicated that it is not always possible to predict the comfort experience associated with a product based on a picture, and that there is a discrepancy between expected and experienced comfort. Experienced comfort is highest for travel pillows that restrict head movements in all directions in order to maintain a neutral posture. The results of this study also support earlier studies that suggested that discomfort experience can be predicted by observing the number of participants’ in‐seat movements; more movements result in higher experienced discomfort.

This study aims to determine similarities and differences in affective experience when manipulating 3 physical user interfaces (PUIs): button, touch screen, and jog dial inputs. First, we conducted literature and expert reviews to identify key affective experiences of PUI manipulation. As a result, seven affective experiences (Softness, Elasticity, Heaviness, Smoothness, Sharpness, Clarity of Feedback, and Rattle) were identified, and they were categorized into two dimensions (Force and Feedback Vibration). Three experiments, including 51 types of buttons, 25 synthesized stimuli for touch screen, and 51 types of jog dials, were then conducted to determine the relationship between affective experiences, satisfaction, and physical parameters of each PUI. According to the results, it was common for all three PUIs that Clarity of Feedback was the most important factor for satisfaction. However, there were also differences between the effects of affective experiences and physical parameters. User satisfaction on manipulating jog dials was found to be less affected by affective experiences than buttons and touch screens. Among physical parameters, the strength of feedback was the most important factor for the affective experience of buttons and touch screens, whereas the period of feedback was the most important factor for jog dials. These similarities and differences could be explained by cognitive and manipulative factors (e.g., attention level, types of feedback, and hand posture of manipulation). The results of this study can help researchers and practitioners better understand and enhance the affective aspects of PUI manipulations.

This article focuses on the ethno‐biological expedition to the Amazon headed by Ettore Biocca between November 1962 and July 1963. Biocca, a parasitologist by training, assembled a multidisciplinary team to carry out an ethno‐biological study of Amazon natives. The expedition work covered the natives' customs, myths, chants, diseases and the hallucinogenic compounds and curare they used, and took into account plants and animals common to the Amazon environment. This article aims to contribute to the understanding of the 20th‐century Western approach to the Amazon people and its cultural importance. It sets out to show how Biocca's encyclopaedic work related to the centrality of Amazonia and its peoples in scientific and cultural debates on modernity and Western culture in the 1960s, and how it connects to Cold War anxieties about the disappearance of ‘uncorrupted’ peoples.

The aim of this article is to shed light on the relationships between science, state and industry in the field of food and nutrition in Norway in the first half of the 20th century with reference to the scientist Sigval Schmidt‐Nielsen (1877–1956). Schmidt‐Nielsen was a health authority employed state chemist at the university in the Norwegian capital and later professor of technical organic chemistry at the Norwegian Institute of Technology in Trondheim. We explore his roles, his research and his consultancy for state and industry at the university and at the institute. The early 1900s were important for the shaping of food and nutrition science as well as the growth of the food industry. During this period, food control and food regulations were implemented. Norway, the context in which Schmidt‐Nielsen worked had only become an independent nation in 1905, and the state administration, as well as the university and institute were young institutions. We argue that this specific situation paved the way for the roles Schmidt‐Nielsen played in academia, state and industry. By combining a biographical approach and a multi‐institutional perspective, new relations between different fields within food and nutrition became visible.

Most hand anthropometric studies are performed on the palmar aspect, while dimensions of the dorsal aspect are also useful in ergonomics and hand modeling. A survey of hand anthropometrics for a Spanish population (69 females, 70 males) is presented. Landmarks were selected to compare lengths from the dorsal and palmar aspects and to be useful for hand modeling and ergonomics design. Ninety‐nine dimensions of fingers and thumb of the right hand (41 lengths, 32 depths, 26 breadths) were collected, including thumb breadths and depths. Descriptive statistics of all the dimensions are presented. Lengths were measured from both dorsal and palmar aspects and paired lengths compared through t‐tests. Significant differences were found in almost all the lengths, showing that databases should explicitly state the aspect (dorsal or palmar) where dimensions have been measured. The data provided are useful for designing tools and hand protections and developing hand models more accurately.

In the knowledge economy, human capital is a key factor in any organization to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage. Thus, selection of competent personnel is the most important function of human resource managers. However, because of a wide range of criteria and organizational factors that affect the process, personnel selection is often regarded as a complex problem that can be answered through multicriteria decision‐making (MCDM) procedures. Despite the great importance of determining a comprehensive set of criteria, it has not gained enough attention in the literature. This study presents a competency framework with five criteria for choosing the best information technology (IT) expert from five alternatives. The stepwise weight assessment ratio analysis (SWARA) and grey additive ratio assessment (ARAS‐G) methods are also used to derive the criteria weights and provide the final alternative, respectively. The results reveal that subject competency is the major criteria in IT personnel selection.

With the increase in air travel, comfort is becoming an important issue with which airlines differentiate themselves in a competitive market. Passengers are paying more attention to their comfort experience during flights. However, passenger comfort is affected by various factors that result from the complex cabin system. Besides, the factors have interrelations between one another. How to identify the key factors and comb through their interrelations to improve passenger comfort efficiently is a critical problem in cabin design. To solve this problem, a hybrid model is proposed to identify the key factors and discuss the interrelation between them based on the questionnaire data. First, factor analysis is conducted to segment complex influencing factors into groups and to extract the most important factors. Decision Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (DEMATEL) method and fuzzy set theory are combined in the next analysis, considering both the interrelation between factors and the fuzziness of subjective comfort perception concurrently. It forms a structural model and then visualizes the causal relationships among factors through a causal diagram. The results of an empirical study show that the proposed model is capable of identifying the critical factors that affect passenger comfort effectively and could offer a priority of factors to improve passenger comfort.

This study is concerned with the characteristics of occupational injuries and sick leave for gas cylinder handling workers. Possible incidents and sick leave have been identified and analyzed for 223 occupational accidents in the gas cylinder handling work. Management level of accidents for prioritizing prevention measures is induced for the combination of accident agencies, types, and gas cylinder handling work processes. Accidents occurring during the specific gas cylinder handling work process showed different characteristics, depending on the type and agency of the accident. Most critical accidents that require corrective actions for prevention were slips and trips caused by floors, walkways, steps, or ground surfaces and overexertion and bodily reaction and posture caused by gas cylinder in the manual delivery of heavy cylinders process. Also, fall to lower level caused by floors, walkways, steps, or ground surfaces in the loading to and unloading from vehicles process and struck by or against caused by fixtures in the manual delivery of heavy cylinders process were also ranked high. The findings of this study can be used to develop more effective accident prevention policies to reduce occupational accidents in gas cylinder handling works.

Studies of lean production's effect on working conditions are mixed but point toward worsened conditions. The aim of this longitudinal study was to assess how lean contributes to transforming work characteristics in a medium‐sized specialized industrial family business. A mixed methods approach was used to combine an external assessment of work characteristics with self‐reported employee questionnaires. Favorable psychosocial working conditions were indicated, with role conflicts decreasing over time. The assessment of work provided descriptions of how lean practices contributed to decreased task control due to standardized work and simplified work processes. At the same time, employees still had opportunities to influence their long‐term work assignment. There was also a trend toward job enlargement through new, higher‐skilled tasks, multiskilling, and extended opportunities to influence work through different continuous improvement activities. The participative lean approach and type of skilled jobs may have contributed to this transformation.

Visual aesthetic directly affects the user's purchase decision and results from the user's analysis and judgment after perceiving product appearance. Therefore, understanding the neural mechanisms of visual experience is critical for product design. This study combined subjective evaluation with ERPs (event‐related potentials) to investigate the user's aesthetic experience as evoked by smartphones. A visual aesthetic scale was constructed, and the results from the questionnaire were used to verify the reliability of the aesthetic scale. Before the ERPs experiment was constructed, smartphones were divided into higher visual aesthetic and lower visual aesthetic based on subjective evaluation according to the aesthetic scale. An amended oddball paradigm was then used in the ERPs experiment. Landscapes were presented as rare targets, while smartphone pictures were presented as frequent nontarget stimuli. The ERPs were then averaged separately for each aesthetic type. Two negative components were recorded and compared with respect to two aesthetic types on the participants’ prefrontal, frontal, and central sites. The smartphone pictures with lower scores of visual aesthetic elicited larger amplitudes of N100/N200 than those with higher scores according to the within‐subjects, repeated‐measures analysis of variance. The exploring of neural responses correlated with visual aesthetic can provide an accurate method of measuring the user's perception and can help marketers know which product gives the user a higher visual aesthetic experience. The difference of ERPs may be taken as an evaluating indicator of product design.

Tasks involving the thumbs of workers are frequently carried out at industrial sites or in laboratories. This study measured thumb endurance time according to relative force levels in males and females. The experiment in this study involved 30 healthy participants (15 males and 15 females). Maximum thumb pressing force (MTPF) was measured and thumb endurance curves were developed using the measured thumb endurance time of participants’ dominant hand according to various force levels (10, 20, 40, 60, 80, and 100% MTPF). On the basis of the results, females demonstrated greater endurance time than males at 20% MTPF, and statistically significant differences according to gender are not shown at MTPF levels of 40% or higher. A rapid increase in endurance time was observed at low force levels. The findings of this study are expected to facilitate the establishment of appropriate working levels for the thumbs of workers in order to optimize work design. In this study, the effects of gender and target force level on thumb endurance time performance were evaluated. The findings of this study could provide valuable information for developing ergonomic guidelines of thumb pressing force tasks for the workers.

In July 1986, the cover of Nature featured rock paintings from the Pedra Furada rock shelter in the Serra da Capivara National Park in Brazil. In that issue, Niède Guidon, head of the excavations at Pedra Furada, co‐authored an article that pushed back the arrival of the first humans to South America to 32,000 years ago. This controversial claim was widely reported by newspapers in Brazil and in other countries like the USA. Using this case, this paper aims to shed light on the role of newspapers in prehistory in three different ways. Firstly, it will analyze how Guidon's early outreach effort helped to transform the Serra da Capivara research into a well‐known scientific project in Brazil – a project that tried to protect and economically promote this area, promoting at the same time the disputed claims. Secondly, this paper will highlight how Guidon's research adapted to the logic of the media by using the rock paintings at Pedra Furada as ‘legitimators’ of the idea of an early human presence in the shelter. And thirdly, this paper will emphasize how newspapers became the platform for the scientific debate that took place before, during and after the discussion in more traditional scientific media. All this will help to provide insight into how newspapers became a crucial agent in the construction of late 20th century prehistoric knowledge.

‘Darwin was wrong’ was a headline that made news around the world in March 1956. Johannes Hürzeler, a Swiss palaeontologist, had just made public his theory that Oreopithecus bambolii, a fossil thus far classified as an extinct Old World monkey, was in fact a 12‐million‐year old hominid. That was 10 million years (!) older than the oldest hominids accepted at the time. Two years later he unearthed a complete skeleton of Oreopithecus in Italy. The echo of this discovery in the media was enormous yet the newspaper coverage in different western countries followed distinctive patterns. This paper will show these differences and point out possible explanations that go far beyond scientific disagreement. It will be argued that the press is a privileged source for comparing simultaneous reactions to the same scientific fact around the globe and for helping us discover national and supranational patterns of scientific discourse while linking them to their contexts. This paper also highlights the role of the news pieces as ‘supports of knowledge.’ Just like bones or scientific articles, news items circulate prompting in turn the circulation of other ‘supports of knowledge’ such as fossil remains or scientists.

This paper focuses on the role of newspapers and journals in constructing the public images of the mammoth in Catalonia in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, paying special attention to the visual power of descriptions, pictures and cartoons of this and other ancient species that increasingly appeared in the press. As palaeontology became a ‘public science,’ the extinct species gained status not least because it could be imbued with multiple meanings that moved between the scientific and public spheres. The visualizations of the animal contributed to metaphorically reinforcing and confronting ideas of political and social scope, like the notions of modernity and national identity, which were of great relevance in Barcelona at the turn of the century.

This article considers the emerging career of school preceptor Florentino Ameghino (1854?–1911), a fossil collector from the Argentine countryside who became an international authority in the 1880s and 1890s in the field of prehistory and the paleontology of vertebrates. Reflecting on investigations in the 1870s about the antiquity of humanity in the Argentine Pampas, Ameghino's story allows us to examine how the press circulated news in a context where political and intellectual matters were closely interconnected. This work is based on a collection of newspaper clippings gathered by Ameghino between 1874 and 1897 and found in the Jorge Furt Library, a private collection of books located near Luján, the city where it is said that Ameghino was born.

Firefighters perform various tasks during firefighting operations under unknown and unpredictable conditions. The present study investigated the impact of firefighting activities and cooling tactics on information processing and work performance. Firefighters performed typical firefighting tasks in the four experimental conditions, namely i) no cooling device (NC), ii) cooling gel (CG), iii) cool vest (CV), and iv) cooling gel and cool vest (CG + CV). The measurement of information processing, Paced Auditory Serial Addition Test (PASAT) scores decreased significantly after the firefighting activities in the four conditions, relative to baseline. The results revealed no significant difference in PASAT scores among the four conditions. However, the performance time (PT) was significantly shorter for the CV and CG + CV compared to the NC and CG conditions. The findings confirmed that the firefighting activities have a detrimental effect on information processing. The CG + CV and CV were more effective than CG and NC in improving PT during firefighting. However, the cooling strategies have a negligible effect on improving information processing performance.

Service recovery is a concept that involves regaining customer satisfaction and loyalty. Although existing studies have addressed its importance, few service recovery methodologies have been developed. Thus, there is a need to develop a systematic framework that can first detect customer status and then provide appropriate recovery recommendations to ensure customer satisfaction. This study develops such a framework in relation to an individual health maintenance practice. While regular moderate exercise is known to promote good health and help prevent disease, the lack of exercise remains a crucial health issue. This study presents a logistic regression model that uses both physiological data (heart rate and blood pressure) and psychological data (ratings of perceived exertion) to detect the effectiveness of an individual's exercise and to provide sports‐related service recovery suggestions as needed. To implement and assess this service recovery model, the use of a motion gaming system is proposed.

Human operators are still a vital resource in modern manufacturing systems, especially for fine assembly tasks. Declining muscle strength due to physical tasks can impair psychomotor skills and can cause adverse effects on assembly quality. To understand how local muscle fatigue can influence multiple psychomotor skills, 20 subjects participated in an experiment in which four psychomotor tests were performed to mimic fine assembly tasks, and their performances under nonfatigued wrist and fatigued wrist conditions were compared. Results showed that wrist fatigue caused significant decrements in the dexterity of fingers and fingertips, but there was no significant influence on arm‐hand steadiness. Local muscle fatigue impairs psychomotor skills to different extents but does not necessarily lead to lower performance. Humans are capable of coordinating motion units to compensate for the influence of muscle fatigue, but this is rather limited. It is suggested that in assembly operations, tasks should be arranged according to different task demands on diverse psychomotor skills.

The aims of this study were to assess postural risks associated with the current gun barrel cleaning method and to develop an ergonomic gun barrel cleaning method that could reduce such risks. The inner surfaces of gun barrels should be cleaned after use to maintain their firing function. The current method of cleaning gun barrels requires multiple soldiers to push and pull a long cleaning pole for 1–3 hr. Such motions require both hands to be raised to shoulder height. The current manual method and a newly designed automated method were compared in terms of safety and effectiveness. Postural risk assessments were performed using OWAS, RULA, and REBA. Results: The manual cleaning method involves the highest postural risk level (Action Category/Level 4), requiring immediate intervention, and exposes multiple soldiers to life‐threatening situations for a longer time during wartime. The postural risk associated with using the automated cleaning system was much lower (Action Category/Level 2). Once loaded into the gun barrel by a single soldier, the automated system takes approximately 20 min to complete cleaning. The automated cleaning method reduces musculoskeletal disorder risks associated with cleaning gun barrels and increases military power. The automated gun barrel cleaning method is an ergonomic solution that can be used for cleaning gun barrels within a short time without exposing soldiers to postural risks.

Industries will implement effective training programs to improve training performance, and an ideal training performance occurs under proper mental workload (MWL). Virtual reality (VR) has recently been widely utilized in training; however, only a few studies have investigated its effects on MWL and training performance simultaneously. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of VR training and traditional training methods, such as technical manuals (TM) and multimedia films (MF), on training performance and MWL. The results of the performance measurement show that VR training is considered the best training method compared to TM and MF, particularly in the case of complex tasks. The results of physiological measurements (GSR [galvanic skin response], LF% [low frequency], and LF/HF [high frequency] ratio) show a significant difference between reading TM and using computer (MF and VR), wherein the latter has a lower MWL. However, no significant difference in subjective MWL assessment (NASA‐TLX [task load index]) and HF% measurement is found.

Human–robot collaboration (HRC) is characterized by a spatiotemporal overlap between the workspaces of the human and the robot and has become a viable option in manufacturing and other industries. However, for companies considering employing HRC it remains unclear how best to configure such a setup, because empirical evidence on human factors requirements remains inconclusive. As robots execute movements at high levels of automation, they adapt their speed and movement path to situational demands. This study therefore experimentally investigated the effects of movement speed and path predictability of an industrial collaborating robot on the human operator. Participants completed tasks together with a robot in an industrial workplace simulated in virtual reality. A lower level of predictability was associated with a loss in task performance, while faster movements resulted in higher‐rated values for task load and anxiety, indicating demands on the operator exceeding the optimum. Implications for productivity and safety and possible advancements in HRC workplaces are discussed.

In May 1911 a seemingly spectacular discovery from the ‘Devil's Cave’ near Steinau, east of Frankfurt caught the attention of German anthropologists. Soon a debate ensued whether the skull was prehistoric or of a rather more recent age. This controversy nearly exclusively unfolded in the newspapers. It was too brief to materialize in scholarly publications because after 2 months it was revealed that the skull had been ‘planted’ by a prankster. This case shows that the press served as a ‘meta‐medium’ for scholarly disputes, but also points to the crucial material dimension of newspaper articles. The actors wrote many articles themselves but they also observed the press systematically, cut out articles, compiled them, cited them in their letters, glued them into their diaries and passed them on. The newspaper articles were the fuel of the debate and the raw material of knowledge in the making. In the Steinau hoax German anthropologists found themselves in a contradictory position: they were quick to dismiss the press as sensationalist, while at the same time they used the newspapers to voice their own interpretation of the discovery.

This study aimed to develop an adaptive neuro‐fuzzy inference system (ANFIS) approach to estimate the normalized electromyography (NEMG) responses, where the independent variables are demographic variables including population, gender, ethnicity, age, height, weight, posture, and muscle groups. The study groups comprised 75 US‐based (54 males and 21 females) and 10 Japan‐based (all males) automobile assembly workers. A total of 65 inputs and 1 output reflecting the NEMG values were considered at the beginning. After correlating analysis results, a total of 35 significant predictors were considered for both ANFIS and regression models. The data were partitioned into two datasets, one for training (70% of all data) and one for validation (30% of all data). In addition to a soft‐computing approach, a multiple linear regression (MLR) analysis was also performed to evaluate whether or not the ANFIS approach showed superior predictive performance compared to a classical statistical approach. According to the performance comparison, ANFIS had better predictive accuracy than MLR, as demonstrated by the experimental results. Overall, this study demonstrates that the ANFIS approach can predict normalized EMG responses according to subjects’ demographic variables, posture, and muscle groups.

When the fossil skeleton discovered in Menton was shown in the Natural History Museum in Paris in 1872, it was the first fossil man to be presented to the public in France. Popular representations of a fossil ape‐man had, however, been circulating in the press since the late 1830s. In fact, at the same time as the scientific debate that ultimately led to the recognition of the existence of prehistoric man, the new profession of science journalist emerged in the public sphere. Once exposed, Menton Man embodied and crystallized rival political positions, which played a part in the debate on the origin of man. In addition, the creation by the press of a public scientific object shaped the image of its scientific counterpart, ‘the discoverer.’ Through the press, in the context of bourgeois tourism in the Riviera, the figure of the palaeontologist of the mass society emerged.

This study aimed to identify the associations among low back pain (LBP), LBP‐related disability, agricultural working condition management, and quality of life (QOL) in Korean farmers. Demographic information, agricultural work management, and outcomes of LBP were obtained by standardized questionnaires (Oswestry Disability Index [ODI] for disability and European Quality of Life‐5 Dimensions‐3‐Level version [EQ‐5D‐3L] for QOL). Presence of LBP was determined if the LBP had lasted longer than 1 week or had been more frequent than once a month, and presence of LBP‐related disability was determined if the ODI score was more than 12. Poor health checkups (OR [odds ratio] = 1.70–86, p < .05), were positively associated with LBP, and working at dawn (OR = 1.85–1.96, p < .05), was positively associated with LBP‐related disability after adjusting related demographic factors. EQ‐5D‐3L indexes were significantly lower in participants with LBP (0.83 ± 0.17 vs. 0.92 ± 0.06, p < .001) and disability (0.81 ± 0.18 vs. 0.93 ± 0.05, p < .001). This study showed that the presence of LBP was related to poor health checkups and that LBP‐related disability was related to a poor working time schedule. These results indicate poor QOL and suggest the need for coping strategies such as regular health checkups and a proper working time schedule.

This study examined the effect of participant physique on the increase in shank circumference (ISC) for the 2‐hr standing. We recruited 20 healthy male participants (10 with normal body mass index (BMI) and 10 who were overweight) and examined their ISC every 20 min under two prolonged standing conditions (static and intermittent standing). Results showed that prolonged standing types, physiques, and sustained time significantly influence the ISC. The ISC during intermittent standing (mean = 0.38 cm) was significantly lower than that observed during static standing (mean = 0.52cm). That is, 1 min of relaxation after every 20 min of standing can effectively relieve the load on the participants’ shank during standing. The normal (BMI = 21.9) group exhibited a significantly higher ISC than the overweight group (BMI = 26.5) did. This increase was also reflected in the subjective discomfort rating results. The standing type may be more dominant than the worker's physique on the lower‐limb loading when performing prolonged standing tasks.

This study is concerned with the characteristics of occupational injuries and sick leaves for the workers doing parking lot management. Possible incidents and sick leaves have been identified and analyzed for 470 occupational accidents in the parking lot management process. Management level of accidents for prioritizing prevention measures is induced for the combination of the accident types and parking lot management processes. Accidents occurring during the specific parking lot management process showed different characteristics, depending on the type of accident and agency of accident. Most critical accidents that required corrective actions for prevention were being struck by an object in the “guide” process and slipping in the “valet parking” process. And, possible incidents predicted also as high level of management were slips in the “fee collection” and “cleaning” processes and falls to lower level in the “operating lift” and “repair” processes. Also, traffic accidents in the “guide” process, overexertion and bodily reaction and posture in the “patrol” process were ranked ‘high. The findings of this study can be used to develop more effective accident prevention policies to reduce occupational accidents in parking lot management.

This study aimed to compare a three‐dimensional (3D) semiautomatic measurement protocol (3D‐SAMP) that measures hand dimensions using a plaster hand and a 3D scanner with the conventional direct measurement protocol (DMP). An experiment was conducted to measure 52 dimensions of one hand by 20 measurers with three repetitions. The locations of landmarks attached to the plaster hand were automatically identified and then measurements of the hand dimensions were automatically extracted in the 3D‐SAMP. Significant measurement differences with a range of 2.1 to 4.4 mm between the 3D‐SAMP and the DMP were observed in 13 out of the 52 dimensions, and the 3D‐SAMP showed better reliability than the DMP in terms of intra‐ and intermeasurer variability. The 3D‐SAMP was found significantly faster and easier in hand measurement than the DMP (11.1 ± 3.5 min for 3D‐SAMP and 17.8 ± 4.5 min for DMP; 5.2 ± 0.8 for 3D‐SAMP and 4.3 ± 0.8 for DMP using a 7‐point scale with 1 for very dissatisfied and 7 for very satisfied for ease of measurement) when fabrication (about 1 hr 10 min) and scanning (3 min) of a plaster hand were not considered. The proposed 3D‐SAMP is applicable only to plaster hands available in hand measurement.

This study was designed to identify the individual and employment factors that influence highly frequent, less severe self‐reported musculoskeletal disorder pain incidences among welders. A self‐reporting questionnaire to measure two individual factors (age and experience), six employment factors (physical workload, working hours, shift work, nature of employment, mode of apprenticeship training, and association with present employer), along with a modified Nordic questionnaire response sheet was used to collect data. The survey was conducted among welders employed in a fabrication cluster in a southern part of India. A total of 987 completed questionnaires (response rate: 66%) were analyzed using the SPSS program. The analysis showed that two employment factors, “shift work” and “mode of apprenticeship training” significantly influence self‐reported musculoskeletal disorder pain. The mode of apprenticeship training was found to influence musculoskeletal disorder pain in the neck region for annual prevalence and causes annual disability in neck and upper back regions. Similarly, shift work was found to influence musculoskeletal disorder pain in the shoulder and neck regions for weekly and annual prevalence and causes annual disability in shoulder, wrist/hands, upper back, and hip/thigh/buttock regions among welders. These factors can be considered as points for targeting intervention efforts.

Ergonomics has been playing an important role in assembly system design (ASD) that contains not only the main assembly line balancing problem but also the subassembly line balancing and assembly layout problem. The ergonomics in ASD has an impact both on productivity and on workers’ health, especially when frequent changes in the product mix occur. In this study, we propose a systematic approach in order to handle ASD, which consists of three subproblems, while considering ergonomic risk factors. The first two subproblems are solved simultaneously using the proposed rule‐based constructive search algorithm, where ergonomic risks are evaluated by OCRA method. Later, layout problem is solved under transportation constraints using local search methods with various neighborhood structures. To provide the applicability and evaluate the performance of the proposed systematic approach, a real‐life case study in a harness manufacturing company is solved and prototype productions are performed.

This study applied a computer program to analyze the descriptors of Japanese characters, including 56 Hiragana, 56 Katakana, and 98 Kanji characters. An experiment was designed to test the legibility of these characters by 40 Japanese students studying in university. Subjects were asked to identify characters displayed in the screen center, shown initially at an illegible size and gradually enlarged until the subject recognized them. The results illustrated that the Hiragana characters were more legible than the Katakana, and the Katakana characters were more legible than the Kanji. Although the legibility thresholds were increased with the number of strokes in these three kinds of Japanese characters, the effects of the number of strokes on legibility among them were different. Increasing one stroke in a Kanji character would necessitate a 0.4‐arcminute enlargement to maintain legibility, whereas no linear stroke effect was found in Hiragana and Katakana characters. This may because of the features of stroke of Hiragana and Katakana are quite different from that of Kanji. Furthermore, for Hiragana and Katakana, adding a semivoiced consonant sign ‘o’ to a common character would necessitate a 7‐arcminute enlargement to maintain legibility and adding a voiced consonant sign ‘ ” ’ to a common character would necessitate a 10.3‐arcminute enlargement to maintain legibility. The results can be used as reference for information and interface design.

This article suggests that 16th‐century sources describing astronomical instruments may be analyzed in terms of ‘geometrical tools’, that is discrete arrangements of lines and curves that solve particular problems. Geometrical tools provided a means for innovation. By playing, literally, with such tools, mathematicians could invent new instruments or add new functions to existing instruments. For a case study of this process, I shall consider the rectangular astrolabe, first proposed in 1515 by Johannes Stabius and reconfigured in several other versions over the course of the 16th century. Geometrical tools, I conclude, are revealed in diagrams found in the sources, not in the accompanying texts.

This article examines the case of an observational and a demonstrational armillary sphere confused, one for the other, by fifth‐century historians of astronomy He Chengtian and Shen Yue. Seventh‐century historian Li Chunfeng dismisses his predecessors as ignorant, and in so doing he supplies the reader with additional evidence. Using their respective histories and what sources for the history of early imperial armillary instruments survive independent thereof, this article tries to explain the mix‐up by exploring the ambiguities of ‘observation’ (guan) as it was mediated through terminology, text, materiality and mathematics. Reconstructing the material features of the ‘sight’ (yi) and ‘effigy’ (xiang), the article will reflect upon the mathematics necessary for their operation. The ‘effigy’, as Li Chunfeng defines it, is a substitute for observation; the ‘sight’, however, is so mediated by the material and mathematical sphere as to confound Li's distinction between looking through and looking at. In the end, however, the difference is moot, since the observational model appears to have played a negligible role in the history of astronomy in first‐millennium China, leaving us to wonder what instrument(s) were used for observation.

Armillary spheres were part of the Sanskrit astronomical tradition, and had been used for understanding the structure of the heavens. Goladīpikā (‘Illumination of the sphere’) is a text in two versions by the same author which deals with structures of the armillary sphere and various related astronomical topics. A close examination of the ways the armillary sphere is described in the two versions of the text will help us understand the main characteristics of the two versions of Parameśvara's Goladīpikā and the reasons why the author duplicated his treatise. This case study thus demonstrates how astral sciences sources from the same author may present mathematical practices surrounding the same instrument in contrasting and complementary ways according to intention.

Manuscript Escorial O II 10 is a late 13th‐century document containing a well‐known collection of astronomical texts from the arts faculty context. During the first half of the 14th century, this manuscript belonged to John of Murs, an important master of art of the Paris University, responsible, with others for the establishment of the Parisian Alfonsine Tables. John of Murs used the Escorial manuscript to record a wide range of notes over a 20‐year period. Among those notes I examine here one concerned with two solar eclipses. Although I will review the relevant information concerning eclipse theory and mathematical practices of European astronomers in the 14th century, this essay will not focus directly on such matters. Rather I am interested in a documentary question: looking at a specific astronomical source I seek clues about the temporal dimensions of a computation as it was recorded in the codex. This focus will help assess the computation practices of John of Murs and will allow an understanding of the meanings such a computational record could have both for its author and in the more general context of early Alfonsine astronomy.

This article introduces a writing format, the ‘template table’ (suanshi, ) that was designed to guide the process of calendrical astronomical calculations in early modern China. In conjunction with another kind of text, known as ‘detailed procedures’ (xicao, ), users could perform calculations easily by operating the ‘template table’ and extracting data from given numerical tables. This method, that not only normalized the use of numerical tables but also linked instructions with the corresponding tables in computational practices, became widespread from the Ming period (1368–1644) onwards. Wanting to acquire this computational regimen, the Joseon court of Korea (1392–1897) even sent skilled officers to China to learn it secretly. The circulation of the template method beyond China suggests its significance. The article also discusses the advantages and disadvantages of using this method.

Medieval tables can be rich sources of evidence about the practices of the mathematicians and astronomers who used them. This paper analyses an important set of tables, revealing their compiler's learning practices and elucidating a valuable document of inexpert science. Peterhouse, Cambridge MS 75.I, ‘The Equatorie of the Planetis’, is a late‐14th‐century compilation. It contains a treatise describing the construction and use of an equatorium (an astronomical instrument that computes the positions of the planets), bound with a collection of related astronomical tables. It was long thought to be written by the English poet Geoffrey Chaucer, but has recently been shown to be the work of a Benedictine monk, John Westwyk. This paper reassesses the manuscript as a monastic compilation. Westwyk copied a set of astronomical tables that suited his needs; their use supported and complemented the equatorium he describes in his treatise. He experimented with different techniques, cited astronomers whose work he admired (including Chaucer) and refined his tables in order to obtain the greatest possible precision. By reconstructing Westwyk's mathematical practices in compiling, computing and using tables that required and enabled a range of astronomical techniques, this paper paints a vivid picture of inexpert science in medieval Europe.

Previous research has shown that short-term mating orientation (STMO) and hostile sexism (HS) selectively predict different types of sexual harassment. In a priming experiment, we studied the situational malleability of those effects. Male participants could repeatedly send sexist jokes (gender harassment), harassing remarks (unwanted sexual attention), or nonharassing messages to a (computer-simulated) female target. Before entering the laboratory, participants were unobtrusively primed with the concepts of either sexuality or power. As hypothesized, sexuality priming strengthened the link between STMO and unwanted sexual attention, whereas power priming strengthened the link between HS and gender harassment. Practical implications are discussed.

Objective

This study aimed to examine the effects of accumulating nursing work on maximal and rapid strength characteristics in female nurses and compare these effects in day versus night shift workers.

Background

Nurses exhibit among the highest nonfatal injury rates of all occupations, which may be a consequence of long, cumulative work shift schedules. Fatigue may accumulate across multiple shifts and lead to performance impairments, which in turn may be linked to injury risks.

Method

Thirty-seven nurses and aides performed isometric strength-based performance testing of three muscle groups, including the knee extensors, knee flexors, and wrist flexors (hand grip), as well as countermovement jumps, at baseline and following exposure to three 12-hour work shifts in a four-day period. Variables included peak torque (PT) and rate of torque development (RTD) from isometric strength testing and jump height and power output.

Results

The rigorous work period resulted in significant decreases (–7.2% to –19.2%) in a large majority (8/9) of the isometric strength-based measurements. No differences were noted for the day versus night shift workers except for the RTD at 200 millisecond variable, for which the night shift had greater work-induced decreases than the day shift workers. No changes were observed for jump height or power output.

Conclusions

A compressed nursing work schedule resulted in decreases in strength-based performance abilities, being indicative of performance fatigue.

Application

Compressed work schedules involving long shifts lead to functional declines in nurse performance capacities that may pose risks for both the nurse and patient quality of care. Fatigue management plans are needed to monitor and regulate increased levels of fatigue.

Objective

To investigate how people’s sequential adjustments to their position are impacted by the source of the information.

Background

There is an extensive body of research on how the order in which new information is received affects people’s final views and decisions as well as research on how they adjust their views in light of new information.

Method

Seventy college-aged students, 60% of whom were women, completed one of eight different randomly distributed booklets prepared to create the eight different between-subjects treatment conditions created by crossing the two levels of information source with the four level of order conditions. Based on the information provided, participants estimated the probability of an attack, the dependent measure.

Results

Confirming information from an expert intelligence officer significantly increased the attack probability from the initial position more than confirming information from a longtime friend. Conversely, disconfirming information from a longtime friend decreased the attack probability significantly more than the same information from an intelligence officer.

Conclusion

It was confirmed that confirming and disconfirming evidence were differentially affected depending on information source, either an expert or a close friend. The difference appears to be due to the existence of two kinds of trust: cognitive-based imbued to an expert and affective-based imbued to a close friend.

Application

Purveyors of information need to understand that it is not only the content of a message that counts but that other forces are at work such as the order in which information is received and characteristics of the information source.

This article contains the first detailed historical study of one of the new high-frequency trading (HFT) firms that have transformed many of the world’s financial markets. The study, of Automated Trading Desk (ATD), one of the earliest and most important such firms, focuses on how ATD’s algorithms predicted share price changes. The article argues that political-economic struggles are integral to the existence of some of the ‘pockets’ of predictable structure in the otherwise random movements of prices, to the availability of the data that allow algorithms to identify these pockets, and to the capacity of algorithms to use these predictions to trade profitably. The article also examines the role of HFT algorithms such as ATD’s in the epochal, fiercely contested shift in US share trading from ‘fixed-role’ markets towards ‘all-to-all’ markets.

Objective:

Four studies were conducted to assess bicyclist conspicuity enhancement at night by the application of reflective tape (ECE/ONU 104) to the bicycle rear frame and to pedal cranks.

Background:

Previous studies have tested the benefits of reflective markings applied to bicyclist clothing. Reflective jackets however need to be available and worn while reflective markings enhance conspicuity without any active behavior by the bicyclist.

Method:

In the first study, reflective tape was applied to the rear frame. Detection distance was compared in four conditions: control, rear red reflector, high visibility jacket, and reflective tape. In the second study, the same conditions were studied with night street lighting on and off. In the third study, detection and recognition distances were evaluated in rainy conditions. In the fourth study, visibility was assessed with the reflective tape applied to pedal cranks.

Results:

In the first study, the application of reflective markings resulted in a detection distance of 168.28 m. In the second study, the detection distance with reflective markings was 229.74 m with public street light on and 256.41 m with public street light off. In rainy conditions, detection distance using the reflective markings was 146.47 m. Reflective tape applied to pedal cracks resulted in a detection distance of 168.60 m.

Conclusion:

Reflective tape applied to the rear bicycle frame can considerably increase bicyclist conspicuity and safety at night.

Application:

Reflective tape is highly recommended to complement anterior and rear lights in bicycle riding at night.

Objective:

The objective for this study was to investigate the effects of prior familiarization with takeover requests (TORs) during conditional automated driving on drivers’ initial takeover performance and automation trust.

Background:

System-initiated TORs are one of the biggest concerns for conditional automated driving and have been studied extensively in the past. Most, but not all, of these studies have included training sessions to familiarize participants with TORs. This makes them hard to compare and might obscure first-failure-like effects on takeover performance and automation trust formation.

Method:

A driving simulator study compared drivers’ takeover performance in two takeover situations across four prior familiarization groups (no familiarization, description, experience, description and experience) and automation trust before and after experiencing the system.

Results:

As hypothesized, prior familiarization with TORs had a more positive effect on takeover performance in the first than in a subsequent takeover situation. In all groups, automation trust increased after participants experienced the system. Participants who were given no prior familiarization with TORs reported highest automation trust both before and after experiencing the system.

Conclusion:

The current results extend earlier findings suggesting that prior familiarization with TORs during conditional automated driving will be most relevant for takeover performance in the first takeover situation and that it lowers drivers’ automation trust.

Application:

Potential applications of this research include different approaches to familiarize users with automated driving systems, better integration of earlier findings, and sophistication of experimental designs.

How do technically-skilled women negotiate the male-dominated environments of technology firms? This article draws upon interviews with female programmers, technical writers, and engineers of diverse racial backgrounds and sexual orientations employed in the San Francisco tech industry. Using intersectional analysis, this study finds that racially dominant (white and Asian) women, who identified as LGBTQ and presented as gender-fluid, reported a greater sense of belonging in their workplace. They are perceived as more competent by male colleagues and avoided microaggressions that were routine among conventionally feminine, heterosexual women. We argue that a spectrum of belonging operates in these occupational spaces dominated by men. Although white and Asian women successfully navigated workplace hostilities by distancing themselves from conventional heterosexual femininity, this strategy reinforces inequality regimes that privilege male workers. These findings provide significant theoretical insights about how race, sexuality, and gender interact to reproduce structural inequalities in the new economy.

Agile manufacturing (AM) has been recognized as an international strategy for improving industrial competitiveness. Agility refers to the ability of an organization to adapt to changes within its environment and to utilize them for earning profit and constituting a major item of expense for any organization, having a palpable effect on its profitability. Manpower utilization is considered as one of the important attributes affecting the organization's ability to be agile. In other words, an effective manpower utilization in any agile environment can reduce the workload and enhance the profitability of any organization. The efficiency of any agile organization lies in improved production, through the utilization of a smaller workforce without impacting on its work‐life balance. Thus, this research is focused on ensuring minimum manpower utilization on the machine shop floor of an Original Equipment Manufacturing (OEM) industry by implementing the Paired‐cell Overlapping Loops of Card with Authorization (POLCA) approach. Effective manpower utilization is an important aspect requiring focus in all areas relating to manufacture. However, POLCA, despite being a powerful and multiapplicative tool for AM, has still not been used by researchers for effective manpower utilization. This article takes initiative in this area.

The Feminist Identity Composite is a commonly used measure of feminist identity development. However, psychometric examinations of this measure with samples of diverse women are lacking. The current study presents the first investigation, to our knowledge, to examine the factor structure of the Feminist Identity Composite with two subsamples of sexual minority women (N = 402). We used exploratory factor analysis (EFA), partial confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), and CFA and found both the EFA and subsequent partial CFA (n = 201) indicated a six-factor solution, which was upheld in the final CFA (n = 201). The results generally corroborated four (Passive Acceptance, Embeddedness/Emanation, Synthesis, Active Commitment) of the five original subscales reported in previous studies with predominately heterosexual (or sexual orientation not reported) undergraduate women. However, the subscale Revelation was further delineated into two subscales labeled Societal Revelation and Contact Revelation. Convergent validity of the obtained Feminist Identity Composite subscale scores was largely supported by correlations in expected directions with measures of perceived sexism and heterosexism. We encourage future researchers to investigate the structural and convergent validity of the Feminist Identity Composite with other diverse samples of women.

According to the spatial agency bias model, in Western cultures agentic targets are envisaged as facing and acting rightward, in line with writing direction. In four studies of Italian participants, we examined the symbolic association between agency and the rightward direction (Study 1, N = 96), its spontaneous activation when attributing agency to female and male targets (Study 2, N = 80) or when judging the authenticity of photographs of men and women (Study 3, N = 57), and its possible relation to stereotype endorsement (Study 4, N = 80). In Study 4, we used a conditioning paradigm in which participants learned a counterstereotypical new association; we developed a novel measure to assess the association between gender and spatial direction, namely, the spatial association task. Participants envisaged and cognitively processed male and female targets in line with the spatial agency bias model and reported lower benevolent sexism after learning a new counterstereotypical spatial association. Our findings raise awareness about the biased use of space (and its consequences) in the representation of women and men, so that all people, and especially communicators and policy makers, can actively intervene to promote gender equality. Additional online materials for this article are available to PWQ subscribers on PWQ’s website at http://pwq.sagepub.com/supplemental

Both traditional gender roles and traditional heterosexual scripts outline sexual roles for women that center on sexual passivity, prioritizing others’ needs, and self-silencing. Acceptance of these roles is associated with diminished sexual agency. Because mainstream media are a prominent source of traditional gender portrayals, we hypothesized that media use would be associated with diminished sexual agency for women, as a consequence of the traditional sexual roles conveyed. We modeled the relations among television (TV) use, acceptance of gendered sexual scripts, and sexual agency (sexual assertiveness, condom use self-efficacy, and sexual shame) in 415 sexually active undergraduate women. As expected, both TV exposure and perceived realism of TV content were associated with greater endorsement of gendered sexual scripts, which in turn were associated with lower sexual agency. Endorsement of gendered sexual scripts fully mediated the relation between TV use and sexual agency. Results suggest that endorsement of traditional gender roles and sexual scripts may be an important predictor of college women’s sexual agency. Interventions targeting women’s sexual health should focus on encouraging media literacy and dismantling gender stereotypic heterosexual scripts.

This article examines the use of battered woman syndrome (BWS) expert testimonies in Canadian case law, regarding cases involving murder or attempted murder of abusive partners by women in violent intimate relationships. The purpose of this article is to contribute to literature about the use of BWS evidence in Canadian jurisprudence with connections to social work. The author provides a historical overview of the use of BWS testimonies in Canada and presents case examples. The article explores the benefits of BWS testimonies, its limitations, recommendations for reformulating its use, and implications for social work practice.