Arthur I. Siegel

TECHNIQUE FOR ESTIMATING TASK COMPLETION TIME FROM PARTIAL DATA

Estimates of task completion time are required to develop production programs, maintenance schedules, and prediction systems. Acquiring such data, when the information is not available in data banks, requires time-consuming and costly observations of task performance. An alternative to direct time-study observation is judgment by a skilled person. An efficient technique for making estimates of task-execution time, along with supporting reliability and validity data, is presented.

Comparison of Category and Magnitude Scales of Technical Skills

Magnitude and category scaling methods were employed by journeymen electronics personnel to scale the apparent complexity of various aspects of their own job. The resultant data indicated that essentially equivalent scales were produced across the methods and that the continua of perceived complexity of 4 “activity” stimuli and of 16 “circuit” stimuli were metathetic. Since the distortions as the result of the introduction of different scaling methods were minimal, the present data suggested support for a single psychophysical law in the avionics job performance area.