Posted in Decision making, tagged Auttomation, Klein, naturalistic decision making, Rasmusson, Reason, SRK on 04/07/2011 | Leave a Comment »
I think it was John Norman who pointed out that accidents in complex automated systems often arise because of unintended interactions between operator and automation where both are trying to control the same system.
Now Johns comment is an insightful one, but the follow on question is, logically, how are automation and operator trying to control the system?
Posted in Aerospace Safety, Decision making, tagged cognitive bias, get there itis, NASA, plan continuation bias, Safety, sunk cost heuristic on 26/06/2011 | Leave a Comment »
Plan continuation bias is a recognised and subtle cognitive bias that tends to force the continuation of an existing plan or course of action even in the face of changing conditions. In aerospace safety it is recognised as a significant causal factor in accidents with a NASA study finding that in 9 out of the 19 accidents studied aircrew exhibited this behavioural bias. The economic theory of the ‘sunk cost heuristic’ may provide a simple explanation.
Posted in Decision making, Uncertainty, tagged HMI, HOT systems, human machine interface, Rasmussen, SRK model, Unreliable airpseed on 18/06/2011 | 1 Comment »
In a previous post I discussed that in HOT systems the operator will inherently be asked to intervene in situations that are unplanned for by the designer. As such situations are inherently not ‘handled’ by the system this has strong implications for the design of the human machine interface.
Posted in Decision making, Heuristics & Biases, Risk, tagged Are we going to Abilene?, bounded decision making, Drinking Own Bathwater, Groupthink, risk reduction on 15/04/2011 | Leave a Comment »
Often times we make decisions as part of a group and in the environment of the group there is a strong possibility that the cohesiveness of the group leads members to minimise interpersonal conflict and reach a consensus at the expense of crticially evaluating and testing ideas.
Posted in Decision making, Heuristics & Biases, Uncertainty, tagged bounded decision making, Bounded rationality, cuban missile crisis, decision making heuristics, epistemic uncertainty on 15/04/2011 | Leave a Comment »
In a series of occasional posts on this blog, I’ve discussed some of the pitfalls of heuristics based decision making as well as the risks associated with decision making on incomplete information or in an environment of time pressure. As an aid to the reader I’ve provided a consolidated list here.
Posted in Decision making, Human error, Humour, Uncertainty, tagged driver behaviour, epistemic uncertainty, rail crossings, Rail safety on 21/03/2011 | Leave a Comment »
This railway crossing near miss due to a driver ‘racing the devil’ is, on the face of it, a classic example of the perversity of human behaviour. But on closer examination it does illustrate the risk we introduce when transitioning from a regine of approved operational procedures to those that have been merely accepted or tolerated.
Posted in Decision making, Heuristics & Biases, Risk Assessment, tagged bounded decision making, downside, Risk, risk versus benefit, uncertainty, upside on 11/01/2011 | Leave a Comment »
As the latin root of the word risk indicates an integral part of risk taking is the benefit we achieve. However often times decision makers do not have a clear understanding of what is the upside or payoff.
Posted in Decision making, tagged Bounded rationality, decision making, epistemic, Risk, uncertainty on 06/11/2010 | Leave a Comment »
One of the current concepts in decision making theory is that of bounded rationality. In essence we (humans) try to act rationally but are constrained by the limits of time and information on our decisions. So if we make decisions in this way what are some useful, ‘tools of the trade’ that can guide our decision making?
Posted in Decision making, Heuristics & Biases, Risk Assessment, tagged affect heuristic, biases, decisions under uncerainty, Risk, uncertainty on 31/07/2010 | Leave a Comment »
So why is one in a million an acceptable risk? The answer may be simpler than we think.
Posted in Bushfire Safety, Decision making, Heuristics & Biases, tagged absurdity bias, Black Saturday, cognitive bias, Heuristics, operation phoenix, Royal commission, stay or go policy, victorian bushfires on 23/05/2010 | Leave a Comment »
Disappointingly the Black Saturday royal commission report makes no mention of the effect of cognitive biases upon making a ‘stay or go’ decision, instead assuming that such decisions are made in a completely rationa fashion. As Black Saturday and other disasters show this is rarely the case.
Posted in Bushfire Safety, Decision making, tagged Ash wednesday, Black Saturday, disaster preparation, Public hazards education, Victorian 2009 bushfires on 14/02/2010 | Leave a Comment »
One of the positive outcomes from a disaster such as Black Saturday is that a window of opportunity opens in which opinions, behaviour and even public policy can be changed.
Posted in Aerospace Safety, Decision making, tagged AF 447, biases, deep stall, Heuristics, RPD on 07/02/2010 | 3 Comments »
From the BEA’s second interim report (BEA 2009) we now know that AF 447 was flown into the water in a deep stall. Given the training and experience of the flight crew how did they end up in such a situation?
Posted in Climate risk, Decision making, Uncertainty, tagged 4AR Report, climate change, epistemic, IPCC, Risk, uncertainty on 08/11/2009 | Leave a Comment »
If you read through the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports you’ll strike qualitative phrases such as’likely’ and ‘high confidence’ to describe uncertainty. But is there a credible basis for these terms?
Posted in Aerospace Safety, Decision making, Technology, tagged A330, Air data, airbus protection laws, automation, expectancy, Iberia FL 1456, naturalistic decision making, NDM, QF72 accident, RPD, software safety on 20/09/2009 | 1 Comment »
Recent incidents involving Airbus aircraft have again focused attention on Airbus’ approach to cockpit automation and it’s interaction with the crew.
Posted in Bushfire Safety, Decision making, Heuristics & Biases, Risk, tagged 2009 Victorian Fires, absurdity bias, affect heuristic, availability heuristic, biases, Black Saturday, conformity bias, decisions under uncerainty, information deficit trap, moral hazard, natural disaster, Risk, Victorian 200 bushfires on 30/08/2009 | 2 Comments »
Fire has been an integral part of the Australian ecosystem for tens of thousands of years. Both the landscape and it’s native inhabitants have adapted to this periodic cycle of fire and regeneration. These fires are not bolts from the blue, they occur regularly and predictably, yet modern Australians seem to have difficulty understanding that their land will burn, regularly, and sometimes catastrophically.
So why do we studiously avoid serious consideration of the hazards of living in a country that regularly produces firestorms? Why, in the time of fire, do we go through the same cycle of shock, recrimination, exhortations to do better, diminishing interest and finally forgetfulness?
I tend towards the integrative rather than reductionist view of engineering and science. I'm interested in emergence, networks, relationships and interfaces as they apply to safety.
