Winfried Hacker

Action Regulation Theory: A practical tool for the design of modern work processes?

Action Regulation Theory is not only a description tool but also a normative guide to efficient and humanized work; it became a foundation of international standards in work design. The regular mode of action regulation is knowledge-based regulation. Innovation in mental work, e.g., product development, follows a hydrid model of action regulation combining knowledge-driven opportunistic sequences with systematically planned episodes of work. Innovative work can be improved by facilitating an interaction of mental and psychomotor operations in action: Thinking in and by action is a general principle of innovative mental work. Action Regulation Theory might explain why, in product development, a hybrid type of cooperative work is more effective than both, group work or individual work.

Effort-Saving Product Representations in Design - Results of a Questionnaire Survey

During the last years engineers of the Munich Technical University and psychologists of the Dresden Technical University have investigated requirements for improved computer tools for designers. Prior studies of the early stages of the design process have shown that generating solutions is largely associated with the use of external representations such as sketches and physical models. In a postal survey 106 designers were consulted regarding the extent and the effects of using such external representations in the early stages of the design process. The results show the dominance of sketches as an external aid and the increasing use of CAD. The designers confirmed that external representations do not only serve as external information storages but as important external aids for, for example, solution development, testing and communication.

Improving engineering design- contributions of cognitive ergonomics

Engineering design is analysed in terms of design problem-solving. Engineering designers of differing productivity hardly differ in mental abilities, especially their tested intelligence. However, they differ in their strategies concerning the analysis of requirements and of the problem, in their search for general principles solving the relevant problem, and in the procedures used for developing specific solutions. Experimental and interview results stress that the interrelationship of thinking and sketching, as well as other kinds of an early low-cost prototyping are of crucial importance for the efficiency of the problem-solving procedure and the result. Possibilities for assisting design problem-solving and to improve the training of designers are discussed.

Design Problem Solving

Zusammenfassung. In zwei experimentellen Studien werden mogliche alternative Bedingungen der losungsguteverbessernden Wirkung einer Frage-Antwort-Technik im Entwurfsdenken (Design Problem Solving) gepruft. In der ersten Studie (N = 84) wurden differential- und kognitionspsychologische Bedingungen gepruft. Eine Aussagenanalyse in einer zweiten Studie (N = 94) sollte die nachgewiesenen Ergebnisse vertiefen. Fur die in beiden Studien ermittelten Losungsguteverbesserungen konnten keine differentialpsychologischen Abhangigkeiten von Vorgehensstilen nachgewiesen werden. In kognitionspsychologischer Hinsicht zeigte sich, dass sowohl Fragen, die die Forderungen der Aufgabe in Erinnerung bringen, als auch Fragen, deren Beantwortung die Auslosung von Denkprozessen fordern, zur Losungsguteverbesserung beitragen. Grosere Effekte werden bei der Kombination beider Fragenarten nahe gelegt. Die Ergebnisse der Aussagenanalyse weisen auf eine sowohl beschreibende als auch begrundende und bewertende Vorgehensweise der Unter...

Design Thinking - Possible Ways to Successful Solutions in Product Development

Engineering design is analysed in terms of design problem-solving. Engineering designers of differing productivity hardly differ in mental abilities, as measured by intelligence testing, but in their strategies concerning the analysis of requirements and of the problem, in the search for general principles that solve the relevant problem, and in the procedures that develop specific solutions. Experimental and interview results stress that the interrelationship between thinking and sketching, as well as other kinds of early low-cost prototyping, are of crucial importance for the efficiency of the problem-solving procedure and the result. Possibilities of assisting design problem-solving and of improving the training of designers are discussed.

Software-Ergonomie: Gestalten rechnergestützter geistiger Arbeit?!

Das Gestalten von Anwendersoftware ist ein abhangiger Bestandteil des Gestaltens rechnergestutzter geistiger Arbeit. Die hierarchische Struktur von Tatigkeiten bedingt eine Hierarchie der Gegenstande der Arbeitsgestaltung. Die Gestaltung der Gesamtaufgabe — orientierbar am Vier-Stufen-System einschlieslich des Konzepts der zyklisch und hierarchisch vollstandigen Tatigkeiten — bestimmt und begrenzt die Gestaltung von Teilaufgaben und Aufgabendetail: Identische Detaillosungen (z. B. Dialoge) konnen gegensatzliche Wirkungen auf den Menschen haben in Abhangigkeit von ubergeordneten Losungen (z. B. der Aufgabenkomplexitat;. Mit einem begrenzten Satz objektiver Tatigkeitsmerkmale eines Gestaltungsinstruments wird es moglich, erwunschte geistige Anforderungen sowie soziale Auswirkungen rechnergestutzter Arbeit mit akzeptabler Sicherheit zu projektieren.

Konstruktives Entwickeln als Tätigkeit - Versuch einer Reinterpretation des Entwurfsdenkens (design problem solving)1Der Beitrag entstand im Zusammenhang mit dem Projekt «Unterstützung der frühen Phasen des konstruktiven Entwurfsprozesses», gefördert von der Deutschen Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG). (Förderkennzeichen HA 2249/12-1).

Zusammenfassung: Auf der Grundlage empirischer Befunde aus der Literatur sowie von Ergebnissen der eigenen Arbeitsgruppe wird gepruft, inwieweit tatigkeitspsychologische Konzepte eine umfassendere ...

The associations of supervisor support and work overload with burnout and depression: a cross-sectional study in two nursing settings.

Aims To investigate the moderating effects of work overload and supervisor support on the emotional exhaustion–depressive state relationship. Background Burnout and depression are prevalent in human service professionals and have a detrimental impact on clients. Work overload and supervisor support are two key job demands and job resources, whose role and interplay for the development and maintenance of burnout and depression are not fully understood yet. Design Two consecutive cross-sectional surveys: survey 1 investigated 111 hospital nursing professionals and survey 2 examined 202 day care professionals. Data collection was completed in 2010. Results After controlling for general well-being and sociodemographic characteristics, nurses’ emotional exhaustion was associated with increased depressive state in both samples. We found a meaningful three-way interaction: our results show consistently that the relationship between emotional exhaustion and depressive state was strongest for nurses with high work overload and low supervisor support. Additionally, nurses with low work overload and low supervisor support were also found to have stronger associations between emotional exhaustion and depressive state. Conclusion The findings indicate that nurses’ reported supervisor support exerts its buffering effect on the burnout-depression link differentially and serves as an important resource for nurses dealing with high self-reported work stress.

Competence Management for the Optimisation of Product Development Processes

This paper presents a concept and a prototypical solution for the management of competences of engineers working in product development processes (PDP). Objectives are the representation of individual personnel competences, their utilisation for PDP planning activities such as the assignment of engineers to design tasks, and the support of human resources development. Main result is an instrument for the rational description of the expertise needed to process new orders and of the competencies of the engineering designers. The prototype implementation of the approach is based on a graph based structure and on rules representing competence requirements of PDP and human competence profiles, both processed by an interference mechanism.

Internal representation of task structure and mental load of work: approaches and methods of assessment.

Abstract A survey is presented of research designed to elucidate problems of mental load in industrial work, using both laboratory experiments and field studies, and examining relationships between the mental demands of jobs and changes during a working spell of various indices of performance and of subjective and physiological effects. An initial enunciation of general principles stresses the importance of internal models, strategies and goals in the organisation of work activities. This is followed by brief accounts of four experimental studies. Of these, one showed that the effects of load are multidimensional, a second gave evidence of shifts of aspiration and motivation, a third illustrated the value of adequate internal models as a means of preventing fatigue, and a fourth indicated that job enrichment which increases the mental demands made by industrial work need not produce undue mental load.