Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm Postures
Ergonomics of human workers is one of the key elements in design and evaluation of production processes. Human ergonomics have a major impact on productivity as well as chronic health risks incurred by inappropriate working postures and conditions. In this paper we propose a novel method for estimat...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Frontiers Media S.A.
2021-01-01
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| Series: | Frontiers in Neurorobotics |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnbot.2020.590241/full |
| _version_ | 1818412744132526080 |
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| author | Luka Peternel Daniel Tofte Schøn Cheng Fang |
| author_facet | Luka Peternel Daniel Tofte Schøn Cheng Fang |
| author_sort | Luka Peternel |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Ergonomics of human workers is one of the key elements in design and evaluation of production processes. Human ergonomics have a major impact on productivity as well as chronic health risks incurred by inappropriate working postures and conditions. In this paper we propose a novel method for estimating and communicating the ergonomic work condition called Binary Work-Condition Map, which provides a visualized feedback about work conditions of different configurations of an arm. The map is of binary nature and is derived by imposing the desired thresholds on considered ergonomic and safety related criteria. Therefore, the suggested arm postures in the map guarantee that all considered criteria are satisfied. This eliminates the ambiguity compared to state-of-the-art maps that uses continuous scales derived from weighted sum of multiple ergonomics criteria. In addition, to combine the advantages of both the binary map and the continuous map, we additionally propose a Hybrid Work-Condition Map that rules out unsuitable workspace with the binary map approach and renders the suitable workspace with the continuous map approach. The proposed approach was tested in simulation for various tasks and conditions. In addition, we conducted subjective evaluation experiments to compare the proposed methods with the state-of-the art method regarding the usability. The results indicated that the binary map is simpler to use, while the hybrid map is a good tradeoff between the binary and the continuous map. In selecting the map, strong points of each map should be considered with respect to the requirements of a specific application and task. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-14T10:52:10Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-7c30c0722bc94f8c86ecf9664f602524 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1662-5218 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-14T10:52:10Z |
| publishDate | 2021-01-01 |
| publisher | Frontiers Media S.A. |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Frontiers in Neurorobotics |
| spelling | doaj.art-7c30c0722bc94f8c86ecf9664f6025242022-12-21T23:05:10ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Neurorobotics1662-52182021-01-011410.3389/fnbot.2020.590241590241Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm PosturesLuka Peternel0Daniel Tofte Schøn1Cheng Fang2Delft Haptics Lab, Department of Cognitive Robotics, Delft University of Technology, Delft, NetherlandsSDU Robotics, The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, DenmarkSDU Robotics, The Maersk Mc-Kinney Moller Institute, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, DenmarkErgonomics of human workers is one of the key elements in design and evaluation of production processes. Human ergonomics have a major impact on productivity as well as chronic health risks incurred by inappropriate working postures and conditions. In this paper we propose a novel method for estimating and communicating the ergonomic work condition called Binary Work-Condition Map, which provides a visualized feedback about work conditions of different configurations of an arm. The map is of binary nature and is derived by imposing the desired thresholds on considered ergonomic and safety related criteria. Therefore, the suggested arm postures in the map guarantee that all considered criteria are satisfied. This eliminates the ambiguity compared to state-of-the-art maps that uses continuous scales derived from weighted sum of multiple ergonomics criteria. In addition, to combine the advantages of both the binary map and the continuous map, we additionally propose a Hybrid Work-Condition Map that rules out unsuitable workspace with the binary map approach and renders the suitable workspace with the continuous map approach. The proposed approach was tested in simulation for various tasks and conditions. In addition, we conducted subjective evaluation experiments to compare the proposed methods with the state-of-the art method regarding the usability. The results indicated that the binary map is simpler to use, while the hybrid map is a good tradeoff between the binary and the continuous map. In selecting the map, strong points of each map should be considered with respect to the requirements of a specific application and task.https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnbot.2020.590241/fullWork-Condition Mapergonomic human arm posturebiomechanical modelgraphical user interfaceinteractive exploration |
| spellingShingle | Luka Peternel Daniel Tofte Schøn Cheng Fang Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm Postures Frontiers in Neurorobotics Work-Condition Map ergonomic human arm posture biomechanical model graphical user interface interactive exploration |
| title | Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm Postures |
| title_full | Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm Postures |
| title_fullStr | Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm Postures |
| title_full_unstemmed | Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm Postures |
| title_short | Binary and Hybrid Work-Condition Maps for Interactive Exploration of Ergonomic Human Arm Postures |
| title_sort | binary and hybrid work condition maps for interactive exploration of ergonomic human arm postures |
| topic | Work-Condition Map ergonomic human arm posture biomechanical model graphical user interface interactive exploration |
| url | https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnbot.2020.590241/full |
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