Ergonomics Books

I've read dozens of articles and/or books on the subject, and this one is the best. It is user friendly, simple to understand, and easy to follow with clear instructions and illustrations -- photographs not drawings. This is not a book for carpal tunnel sufferers. It is for anyone who wants to use a computer to maximum effect and minimal strain and damage to the body overall. Linden's credentials include two black belts in the martial arts and a Ph.D. in physical education. He offers a unique way of improving posture while sitting at a computer with an item that costs about two dollars, and I found it to be far more effective and comfortable than the famed aeron chair.

and the man is the real thing. He's a small man and I've seen him throw guys twice his size with no effort, and I've felt him throw me too. I haven't read his book but I've given this five stars because after being on the mat with him and having the chance to talk to him about the book afterwards, you couldn't meet a nicer or more unpretentious guy. He *definitely* knows what he's talking about when it comes to body movement and if you *actually follow* what he's telling you to do instead of dismissing it like the person above who gave it 1 out of 5 did, I'm sure it'll work. I'm damn sure his aikido works, so I'd like to recommend this just on those grounds alone :-)

I completely disagree with the review below from 1/29/01. The most important tool to overcome repetitive strain injury is awareness of how you are using your body & how you may be injuring it by the way you move (or by not moving enough!). The exercises in this book help you become much more aware of your posture, body tension, & awkward movements that may be causing your problems. Learning how to relax your body is essential to recovery.

Even better, the guidance on how to sit has changed my life. I can finally work at my computer without back pain!

BTW, I also recommend Pascarelli's excellent book. These two complement each other nicely.

I've developed intense pain from using the mouse (both on right and left hands). I was doing a lot of graphic work, lots of double clicking and dragging. Going weekly to the chiropractor relieved 20% of the pain. After one session with a Feldenkreis practioner, 80% of the pain was gone. She lent me the 1st edition of this book, which is what the review is based on.

I've taken Feldenkreis lessons before, but never noticed much difference. I now realize that this pain has raised my awareness levels of my body in a way I didn't know before. Now I can do simple Feldenkreis lessons at home and feel a definite difference in muscles being looser and moving better. This book is great on raising my body awareness while I am at the computer.

I've professional training in safety and ergonomics. I learned more from this book that was not covered in previous professional training. Understanding about the proper pelvis position while sitting and how it affects your arms was an eye opener. The general public has a misunderstanding of what good posture is supposed to look like.

The only thing I would recommend is a more in depth chapter on the different types of mice (pointing devices) and keyboards available out there, their pros and cons. Having to choose a new pointing device and keyboard for myself has been a daunting task. I've already returned 2 keyboards with centrally located touchpads that relieved some of the pain, but not all. I'm now considering a vertical mouse and the comfort keyboard, which would keep my hands in the vertical position. Maybe this is covered in the new book edition or maybe this topic is too individual to be covered in a generic book.

As the author mentioned to me in an e-mail:

If you sensitize yourself to feelings of balance and ease in your body, you will be better able to detect which ergonomic devices are actually helpful.

I particularly enjoyed having him respond to specific questions I posed.

Highly recommended!

This book is a mushy worthless waste of reading time. I stopped reading after 4 chapters of stuff like, "Now close your eyes and imagine stretching your fingers. Feel the difference. Visualize a butterfly...blablabla"

The "It's not Carpal Tunnel" book was much better; full of stretches and useful advice.

Ergonomic Living gives you the tools to make healthful decisions. This book cuts through the mountains of adhype that surround virtually every home and office product. I would like to see the author write a sequel.

I can see how Gordon Inkeles, the great massage author, became interested in this health-oriented subject. Co-author Iris Schencke is an ergonomics expert. Their collaboration produced a winner-a book that you will turn to again and again to make your life less stressful. Unlike so many self-help programs, the suggestions here really work.

How can you NOT love a book with a chapter called "How to Sleep?" Believe it or not, there is zero hype here. The authors have done their ergonomic homework and the solutions they come up with will amaze you. Highly recommended!

While I did learn several things about ergonomics, I finally put the book down when I got tired of the preaching. Many of the author's topics were not on subject and, instead, were rantings about the time we spend watching television or other pet peeves of the authors. It got really old. I was looking forward to learning how to design my home. I didn't need the nagging. I would not recommend this book to anyone.

This trade paperback is chock full of practical advice and downright wisdom. It tells us how to structure home and office to fit the human body, all its limitations and wondrous powers. Ergonomic Living follows its own advice such that form follows function and use.

The book has two major sections, home and office. There are eleven chapters: How to Enter Your Home, How to Relax, The Inner Circle. Each briefly introduces a series of concise, well-designed modules: The Deafening Kitchen, Wiring and Cables, Effective Ambient Lighting, Choosing the Right Pillow. The photos and illustrations are excellent. "You have a right to an ergonomic kitchen in which your personal needs, both physical and mental, come first." The authors show you how to exercise that right. Right on!

For many parents, the chapter on creating a child-friendly home will, by itself, be worth the price of the whole book.

My edition is a little out of date on some things, but the principles remain sound, the information useful. For example, someone ready to buy a DVD recorder will profit from the section on selecting a VCR. The summary still applies: "Difficult to memorize controls are never used. Remotes keyed to newspaper codes will be used frequently. Remotes keyed to instruction booklet diagrams will be ignored. Tactile well balanced [sic] remotes will remain near your hand. Slippery, flat remotes will end up on the floor. Basic controls should be immediately obvious."

_Ergonomic Living_ is a warm, pragmatic and, yes, wise book. It concludes, "Change, movement and grace. This is a friendly world; we built it, and now we have the tools to live in it on your own terms. We can choose to inhabit healthful, comfortable environments, amicable places that serve our needs. We can be the masters of our own possessions, the actors on a human-centered stage. We can feel good all day."

Whether you are new to the home office or a seasoned pro, this brilliant book can help you feel better all day.

Ken Graff
©2003, Words in Action
www.wordsinaction.biz
(626)755-3067

For those who are interested in the study of humen error and confiability based on a cognitive approach, this is a basic reading! For those longing for a more comprehensive approach, it is only the first step. But it's worthwhile.

This book is a very complete and well done review of the history and mechanisms of human error. I can't think of a better reference book. It takes some work to extract the knowledge from the rather concentrated material, but it is well worth it. I generally like an easier, novel-type read, but there are plenty of other books on human factors that provide that. This one shines in the very systematic and complete treatment of the subject. And the bibliography is excellent, because it facilitates the easy branching out into all of his sources. Speaking of people mentioned, I knew I would like it when he spoke highly of Donald Norman. He also mentions Perrow's 'Normal Accidents', which is an excellent book. Also the quote from Ernst Mach can lead into a fascinating side trail of discovery on that man. But mainly his dedication of the book to Jens Rasmussen sent me off on a trail of his work, which is quite prolific. I think this is academia at its best - building on the work of predecessors to help further development of tools and understanding on how to solve practical, real world problems.

This is a seminal work for anyone working in hazardous industries. I work in the aviation industry and I found this book to be so enlightening and useful. Whilst industry should always strive towards ensuring that errors do not occur in the first place, it will never be possible to eradicate them totally. Therefore all organisations should aim to `manage' errors. Professor Reason refers to the two components of error management namely error containment and error reduction.

To prevent errors from occurring, it is necessary to predict where they are most likely to occur and then to put in place preventative measures. Incident reporting schemes do this for the industry as a whole. Within an organisation, data on errors, incidents and accidents should be captured with a Safety Management System (SMS), which should provide mechanisms for identifying potential weak spots and error-prone activities or situations. Output from this should guide local training, company procedures, the introduction of new defences, or the modification of existing defences.

According to Reason, error management includes measure to reduce the error susceptibility of particular tasks or task elements; determine, assess and then remove error-producing factors within the workplace; identify organisational issues that generate error-producing factors within the individual, the team, the task or the workplace; improve error detection; increase the error tolerance of the workplace or system; make latent conditions more visible to those who operate and manage the system; improve the organisation's intrinsic resistance to human fallibility.

It is important that organisations balance profit and costs, and try to ensure that the defences which are put in place are the most cost-effective in terms of trapping errors and preventing catastrophic outcomes.

Reason teaches that error management seeks to prevent errors from occurring and eliminate or mitigate the bad effects of errors. One of the things likely to be most effective in preventing error is to make sure that people follow procedures. This can be effected by ensuring that the procedures are correct and usable, that the means of presentation of the information is user friendly and appropriate to the task and context, that employees are encouraged to follow procedures and not to cut corners.

This is a well written book that is a must read for anyone working in hazardous industries where safety is number one priority.

This book is a must have resource for the serious failure analyst. I am responsible for root cause analysis of events at a nuclear power station and we have this as required reading for our root cause analysts.

Furthermore, my experience with other companies who specialize in failure analysis and nuclear industry oversight agencies indicates that the information presented in this book is widely used and respected. More than that - the information helps you to prevent events and solve recurring problems because you get to the latent organizational and human roots.

My copy has gotten dog-eared and has all kinds of notes in the margins. It's absolutely indespensible as a resource for any organization where a strong safety culture (for your employees and your customers) is a necessary part of your business.

An excellent treatise on the subject of human error, written with a cognitive psychology approach. The treatment of the subject matter is more theoretical and less practice-oriented. The book begins with clear definitions, classifications and explanations on the different types of errors, quickly runs through the relevant literature and scientific studies and expands on the typology using Rasmussen's classification as a base. The author then goes on to describe his well-known Swiss Cheese model and provides an excellent overview of accident causation from a system-thinking perspective. He ends with a note on the methodological assessment of error risks which is perhaps more relevant to safety practitioners. The entire book is written in clear simple language that is easily understood, fascinating and intellectually stimulating, even to non-psychologists.

Wickens & Hollands cover human factors (which they call engineering psychology in their title) thoroughly in this volume. If you found Donald Norman's "The Psychology of Everyday Things," useful, but want something more in-depth, you may find this academic textbook useful. It covers a great deal of research on several topics critical to software user interface design, such as, attention & perception, spatial displays, memory & training, and decision-making.

Good academic book on study of human psychology and performance in relation to Safety.

Wickens' book, though slightly dated, provides an integrative review of applied psychological research that remains without peer. It offers students of engineering and design a solid theoretic pillar for the relevant psychological issues. Paired with an applications-oriented text of similar quality, one has much of the material needed for a graduate-level introduction to human factors engineering.

As a budding Usability Engineer I have to say that early in my career I had heard about Wickens as he a prof of Human Factors Engineering around the Chicago area (if I am not mistaken about the area). I bought the book when I could find it on sale once, and it's been a prized possession ever since. Of all my books, only one person I've ever allowed to borrow this one.

This book is very dense, everything that the writer puts forth is not only fully explained in detail, but is also backed-up solidly with cited evidence. It's a great book and I honestly would reccommend anyone into Usability or Human Factors get this book and you'll find too it's in your library and highly used. Personally mine has different colored flags everywhere for different points and things to notice.

I must say though, that this is not a fast read (due to the information), and it's not necessarily a 'fun' read - but for solid information, I dont see how this book can be beat.

-Dustin

Bravo! Aki Busch takes us on a charming and provocative stroll both through her home and each of ours. Ever wonder why you still have a front door? Or whatever happened to the front porch? Or why your kitchen and closets and garage are so essential? READ THIS BOOK and find out!!

I found the core notion that our home designs don't fit our lives to be very interesting. But be warned that the book is a series of very personal, sometimes bordering on superficial, essays. Beyond the core notion, I didn't find much to relate to in Busch's observations about her own
(upper class, domesticated) life. She often makes blanket statements about how "we" live that more than once made me feel like she was writing for a whole other group of people I've never met. That said, if you do feel included in her blanket statements, you might love the book.

This little book of essays is a fine read -- brightly written, free of the usual jargon, quick with insight. It helps the reader to understand why that expensively furnished living room lies silent while the kitchen bussles with everything but cooking. I enjoyed it immensely.

Many teachers are fond of saying that, "computers are just another educational tool." This implies that there is no computer revolution in education. A black board or a pencil is very similar to a computer. What they miss is how those tools changed education. Changes in pedagogy did not happen because educators wanted to change education. They happened because humans interacted differently with their environment because of these tools. Assistive Technology: Essential Human Factors, particularly chapters five and nine, helps educators assess how to evaluate the effectiveness of assistive technology and computers. Before you create your lesson plan or schedule an IEP meeting, you should know what an assessment of human factors would tell you about your educational plans.
And if , by chance, you think this is the responsibility of your school district educational technologists, just ask them what they know about the human factors involved in using technology.
This is an excellent book to begin to explore why some assistive technology works and some fails.

This book provides guidelines to follow when working with clients who use assistive technology. It is an excellent resource for all present and future Speech-Language Pathologists and all those who interact with users of assistive technology. A must have reference for your professional library!

Vicente himself observed that before him there only existed sophisticated guidelines on different aspects of human-machine interaction but no holistic approach that is fit for the engineer. So he undertook the work and succeeded. Building on known technics he refined and combined them to form a coherent framework that guides you from the first assessment to the final delivery, putting emphasis on the 'get it right the first time' principle.

In contrast with other books on human machine interaction the ideas of the book are coherent, logical and refreshing to read.

The work is intended for big industrial projects, so our positive experince with a small-scale project is not representative. Still, Vincentes book is not a cookery-book but on the abstract and generic level and capable of being used in very different enviroments.

The only drawback is the use of the example microworld. I believe that most readers would have rather read about Vincentes experience in nuclear power plants with all its technical complexity than being bored by his fabricated and dull pump system.

For some time now, I have been interested in the work of Jens Rasmussen and Kim Vicente. A dive into their work is a must for all cognitive engineers/psychologists within the field of man-machine interaction. What has been lcking from their work however, is an overall framework. What is the relation between the SRK taxonomy, direct perception, the decision ladder etc.? In this book Kim Vicente presents such a unifying framework for a "formative" approach to design of complex sosiotechnical systems. The first five chapters brilliantly summarises the problems related to the current establishment within the field. Normative approaches and a representational approach to human cognition neccesarily leads to problems of how to design for the unanticipated. For those familiar with the EID approach, buy this book NOW. For those who are not, I would recomend also reading some of the earlier materilal.

Thomas Hoff, Dept. of product design, Norwegian University of Science and Technology

This is the third book I've purchased on ergonomics by Dan MacLeod. The first was The Office Ergonomic Kit - buyers beware! With the exception of approximately 24 additional pages in The Ergonomics Kit for Industry, these books are IDENTICAL! On a positive note, if you are looking for a good overview of ergonomics, either one of these books is worth buying - just not both of them.

This is an outstanding tool and resource for developing an ergonomics program. It gives step by step instructions for developing, implementing, and managing an ergonomics program. All the forms you'll need including symptom survey, worksheets, and employee self-evaluations are provided in Microsoft Word on disk. Also provided on disk are Power Point files containing supervisor and employee training aids as well as training handouts in Word. The book is easy to read and the process for developing an ergonomics program is easy to follow. I recommend this book to anyone considering developing and implementing a new ergonomics program.

Having heard that this was the seminal work in usabiliy, my expectations were probably too high.

Some of the principles laid out are indeed excellent and well illustrated.

The structure of the book is - ironically - not crystal clear. As I am reading the book I find myself looking back at the table of contents to understand the structure.

The writing style is slightly entertaining at first and you sympathize with the author hanging out himself as a clumsy and spacey academic. However, after the first 30 pages the rambling style and the somewhat unstructured content makes the book really boring. I had to push myself to finish it.

What strikes me is the lack of other books in this topic. Despite my criticism I'd be curious to read Norman's new book.

very nice delivery very fast response. One of the best sellers at amazon.
will do business any time with them.

Written by a Usability Guru, some of the examples are a little dated, but still valuable for today's usability issues. A good read and well written.

Norman has created an entertaining and enlightening treatise on the psychology of everyday objects. Why do some things work so well while others completely baffle? What distinguishes successful utility from frustration? How does one research and develop successful products? Most importantly, how does one avoid wasting time developing products that are doomed to fail? Many everyday objects are examined for their utility and user-friendliness. Norman uses three basic concepts, Affordances, Constraints, and Mappings to deconstruct everyday objects.
If you are designing Web sites, user interfaces for computer applications, writing manuals, or creating anything that will be used by a human being, this book will help you succeed. Norman encourages you to remove your creativity and ego from the process by affording you the objectivity to examine the goal from the point of view of the user. He shows you how social and cultural constraints can be used to enhance products.
An excellent book but you must understand that using Norman's advice requires no small amount of humility which makes it difficult to sell to established shops. For instance, I know a Web design team that uses the "don't make them think" mantra for many decisions. But they've been using it so long they think they know everything about the best Web interface design. Their prejudices get in the way of successfully developing half of their projects because they can no longer think like users and visitors. They might never be able to use Norman's advice because they'd see it as obvious and pedestrian.

Even though some people think this is not useful in practice, I strongly believe this is a must read for anyone who designs an artifact for users. A very amusing and thoughtful book. Can even be used as a required reading in many courses such as UI design.

There is a definite demand for this handbook based on the price I would say. Honestly, it is wide-ranging in its scope of the IE function reflecting the diversity of Industrial Engineering in general. I like the concise format for that very reason. I am an old fashioned Motion and Time Study IE and the ever evolving nature of the field based on exponentially improved communications and technology at our fingertips has slanted and re-postured the nature of Industrial Engineering. This new slant is well represented here and is an indispensable source of reference for new IEs and the old timers like myself. I was recently told that an Engineer is an Engineer is Engineer etc. That may be but you still have to say current in your field. This handbook is an invaluable concise reference and a good starting point for whatever diverse topics you wish to review and investigate.

As an IE graduate I've first entered manufacturing and progressed to service management in the airlines, this is still the bible for my daily work reference. Topics cover enormous grounds useful in multi industries and yet each topic is given ample depth. Chapters are structured for easy reference and search. Even if you're not an IE, there is just so much you can use in the book.

A great reference book for engineers who would like to implement process re-engineering. Industrial Engineering tools & methods are provided in this book.

El voluminoso libro consiste en un compendio de diferentes artículos que cubren múltiples aspectos del campo de la Ingeniería Industrial, todos ellos descritos por autoridades en la materia (principalemente profesores de Universidad).

Justamente es el enfoque lo que hace ser un texto casi de introducción para cada uno de los temas tratados. La amplitud de los temas, son de tal calibre que o bien la descripción queda corta o bien el autor quiere incluir el máximo de detalle que llega a ser intratable como introducción.

Cada uno de los capítulos, son de por sí temas que merecen una descripción más detallada en libros por separado.

Para mi gusto, el mismo objetivo se cubre ampliamente en los libros del profesor Roger G. Schroeder (Operations Management), con una didáctica muchísimo más clara y con ejemplos más actualizados.

Carlos Ortega
2006-01-30

I've been a professional IE for more than 15 years and I bought this "manual" thinking that it would actually be a summary of the most important tools used in this profession, but I realized that it is not. It is way to general and it has lost most of the formulas and calculations that are required as an IE. There is too much wording and too little math. If you are a manager and you don't care for the how to, this is good for you. If you are in the field, and you need a quick reference on how to calculate things and how to implement them , you got to look for another book.