Cognitive engineering is the analysis, modeling, design and evaluation of effective human integration in complex sociotechnical systems. As cognitive engineers, CERG researchers aim to provide better integration between human operators and the system they control. The goal is to help human operators act more effectively to preserve system safety and productivity if unexpected situations arise. 

At CERG we examine human-system integration from theoretical and methodological viewpoints, in the field and in the laboratory, and we make substantive contributions to practice. See CERG Publications.

• Thesis research topics. Some potential thesis topics for Honours, Masters, and PhD students are on our Thesis Projects page. We are also friends of the PhD oral defence as a form of PhD examination -- a description of how we do this, where appropriate, at UQ is on our PhD Oral Examination page.
• Clinical trials. We also have a graphical flowsheet for UQ researchers and others about approvals and paperwork associated with mounting a clinical trial before being able to access funding from an awarded research proposal, based on our own experiences. Yellow highlight(s) is(are) where we are up to on a new award.
• NICTA. We are also forming a strong association with NICTA (National ICT Australia)--more details as they come to hand. For information about NICTA, see Long NICTA Video [03:51] or Short NICTA Video [00:35] on YouTube.

|  Critical care  |  Process control  |  Air Traffic Control  |  Defence  |  Attention-aware displays  |  OpenSHAPA  |  Past projects  |
 

CERG researchers and collaborators in the Royal Adelaide Hospital patient simulator, running the first study for David Liu's thesis (September 2006). From left to right, A/Prof Marcus Watson, Terry Leane, Tania Xiao, Professor Penelope Sanderson, Dr W John Russell, Phil Cole, Dr Simon Jenkins, and David Liu.

Critical care

• Clinical trial of respiratory sonification. We will perform a clinical trial of our respiratory sonification technology. This will be the first trial of the respiratory sonification in the clinical context. Our goal is to determine the validity, usefulness, and appropriateness of the respiratory sonification in practice, and to evaluate training needs. The research is being done in by Professor Sanderson (UQ), A/Prof Watson (UQ, Queensland Health's Skills Development Centre), Dr W John Russell (Royal Adelaide Hospital), Dr Richard Morris (The St George Hospital), Dr Kersi Taraporewalla (Royal Brisbane and Women's Hospital), and Dr Simon Jenkins (Royal Adelaide Hospital). NHMRC Development Grant (2008).

• Prospective evaluation of healthcare ICT in critical care. In this research we will develop better ways to predict the impact of new technologies on medical and nursing work in critical care environments. We will examine spatial and temporal coordinative needs and will build analytic techniques that can be used prospectively for technology assessment. Collaboration is with Dr Bala Venkatesh at Princess Alexandra Hospital. Tania Xiao is doing her PhD in this area. ARC Discovery Grant (2008-2010) and UQ Postgraduate Research Scholarship.

• Interruptions and prospective memory in the Intensive Care Unit. We are examining the impact of information and communication technology on planning and coordination in and around the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), with a view to developing better ways to predict the impact of new technologies on medical and nursing work in critical care environments. Collaboration is with Dr Bala Venkatesh at Princess Alexandra Hospital. Tobias Grundgeiger is doing his PhD research in this area, using field research. NHMRC Centre of Research Excellence in Patient Safety (project period 2007-2009).

• Modeling coordination for nurse scheduling and rostering. We are using nurse scheduling and rostering as a problem to address broader theoretical issues about coordination in cognitive engineering and organisational psychology. Collaboration is with Dr Bala Venkatesh at Princess Alexandra Hospital. Tania Xiao is doing her PhD research in this area, using field research. ARC DP (2008-2010).

• Advanced auditory displays and head mounted displays for anesthetists. In this research we are exploring the advantages and disadvantages of sonification, blood pressure earcons, and head-mounted displays for monitoring of patients under anesthesia. Sonification is the representation of data relations in sound relations and earcons are short musical motifs that express data relations. Head mounted displays provide anesthetists with an ever-present display of patient vital signs that removes the need to remember to turn to look at visual monitors along with the inconvenience of doing so, as when in the middle of a procedure. David Liu is doing his PhD on the role of the HMD in particular and will contact our first clinical trial of advanced displays. Professor Sanderson and Associate Professor Watson are collaborating on this research with Dr W John Russell and Dr Simon Jenkins at Royal Adelaide Hospital. ARC Discovery Grant (2005-2007).

• Evaluation of critical care alarm standards. New standards for critical care alarms have been proposed (IEC 60601-1-8) but no empirical report has been made of their effectiveness. CERG researchers such as Alex Wee have tested participants' ability to discriminate and identity the new alarm sounds. Research to explore alarm redesigns is being done by Professor Sanderson and Associate Professor Watson in collaboration with Dr Chris Thompson of Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, Sydney. ANZCA grant (2006+)

• Modeling training needs for neonatal resuscitation. What are the training needs for neonatologists learning to perform neonatal resuscitations? Simulators have been developed, but how should they be used as part of a training program? Collaboration is with Dr Helen Liley at Mater Mothers' Hospital. For his PhD, Itsik Nadler is bringing novel theoretical approaches to this issue. Performed in collaboration with Mater Mothers' Hospital and QH Skills Development Centre (2008+).

Process control

• Advanced diagnosis and operator performance in the chemical industry.  Major industrial accidents such as the Longford and Olympic Dam fires and explosions cost Australian industry millions of dollars a year and possibly billions over the long term. Together with BlueScope Steel and BP, we are developing an integrated approach to process diagnosis based on a novel multiscale-multifunctional framework that will lead to new hazard identification methods that will, in turn, inform advanced multi-agent diagnostic systems and novel operator interface designs. We hope to make significant improvements in abnormal condition management. Performed with Professor Ian Cameron (Project leader: Chemical Engineering, UQ) and Professor Katalin Hangos (Hungarian Academic of Sciences). ARC Linkage Project (2007-2010).

• Information representation for power generation control rooms. We are examining issues relating to human supervisory control in the deregulated electricity market, in collaboration with Professor William Wong at Middlesex University and Dr Rizah Memisevic at Powerlink Queensland. Xilin Li is completing her PhD on the evaluation of advanced display concepts for hydropower operations in the dynamic deregulated Australian electricity market. ARC Centre for Complex Systems (2003-2006+).

Air Traffic Control 

• Predicting workload through situational complexity in ATC. In a recently-awarded ARC Linkage grant with Key Centre colleagues, we are performing empirical tests in a high-fidelity ATC simulator and cognitive modeling to better understand sources of difficulty in air traffic control operations. The goal is to develop dynamic models of air traffic controller workload that have the potential to operate in near-real time and to help air traffic control management make decisions about changing sector dimensions and staffing in response to traffic load. Performed in collaboration with Dr Andrew Neal, Prof Mike Humphreys, Prof Peter Lindsay, Prof Graeme Halford, Dr Peter Kwantes, Dr Christine Boag, Dr Shayne Loft and Martijn Mooij. Industry sponsor is Airservices Australia. ARC Linkage Grant (2004-2007).

Defence

• Evaluating human performance with new technologies. We are using Cognitive Work Analysis to develop an analytic framework in which to predict the most sensitive measures of human performance when defence systems undergo technology upgrades.  Prof Sanderson is supervising DSTO researcher David Crone's PhD on this topic, with DSTO colleagues Dr Neelam Naikar as associate supervisor and Dr Simon Parker as collaborator. Ongoing part-time PhD research (2001-present)

Attention-aware displays

• Head-mounted displays. From our applied work on advanced auditory displays and head-mounted displays for anesthesiologists comes a more general interest in perceptual and attentional issues associated with the use of head-mounted displays (HMDs). PhD student Stas Krupenia and honours student Sean Lowe are examining why HMDs sometimes focus attention so that events in the external field of view are missed. ARC DP 2005-2007 and School of Psychology.
• Multisensory data integration. Honours student Matt Thompson is examining whether people's ability to monitor visual objects on an HMD is affected when sound integral to object behaviour is delivered via free-field speakers vs. via ear-piece. ARC DP 2005-2007 and School of Psychology.

OpenSHAPA

• Video analysis with OpenSHAPA. Development of a new open source video analysis tool--OpenSHAPA--is under way, supported by The University of Queensland, New York University, and contributions of researchers who wish to move from MacSHAPA to OpenSHAPA. Developers are Professor Penelope Sanderson, Professor Karen Adolph, John Mainzer and Felix Gill-Alvarez. See http://www.openshapa.org/

• Control room alarm management. We looked into the problem of alarms in an electricity transmission corporation's main control room. Many thousands of alarms occur each day, making to difficult to assure that the most important alarms are attended and handled appropriately. The goal was to review strategies for handling the volume of alarms and to propose and implement a way forward. We brought our knowledge of power system operations and of the human response to alarms to this project. Personnel involved were Prof Sanderson, Dr Memisevic, Dr Watson, and Dr Austin Adams. Powerlink Queensland (2004-2006)

• Information representation for power generation control rooms. In this ARC SPIRT grant with the Snowy Mountains Hydro Electric Authority, Professor Penelope Sanderson and Dr Rizah Memisevic examined the role of information design for participants in the recently deregulated Australian electricity market. In the space of a few years, the role of human operators in power plant control rooms has moved from almost exclusively focusing on control of plant towards a growing consideration of market conditions and market goals. The technical and information technology infrastructure has evolved as the market has been introduced. Our goal in this project was to determine the impact of information design based on Ecological Interface Design upon human operator discretionary activity and upon control stability. ARC SPIRT Grant (2001-2003), Snowy Hydro Limited.

• Air defence and AEW&C. This was one of a series of research contracts applying Cognitive Work Analysis approaches to the analysis, modeling, design and evaluation of human-system integration in the Commonwealth of Australia's Airborne Early Warning and Control platform (AEW&C) (DSTO AMRL). Performed by Professor Penelope Sanderson with Dr Neelam Naikar at DSTO. Research Agreement with DSTO (2000-2001)

• Sonification in the critical care environment. We undertook research on sonification in anesthesia environments, focusing especially on respiratory sonification and issues relating to multimodal displays. This work was led by Prof Sanderson and Dr Marcus Watson in collaboration with Dr John Russell at Royal Adelaide Hospital. ARC Discovery Grant (2002-2004)

• Patient information representations for the ICU. This research led by Dr Anne Miller took a critical look at the effectiveness of the abstraction-decomposition framework for performing Work Domain Analysis. It proposed an alternative framework for modeling the ICU patient that nonetheless preserves the intention behind Work Domain Analysis and Cognitive Work Analysis. On the basis of this alternative model, Miller developed and tested a low-level prototype of a novel ICU patient information system. Princess Alexandra Hospital and Key Centre seed funding, 2004.

• Communication and handover in the ICU. In this research performed with Dr Bala Venkatesh and Tony Limpus at Princess Alexandra Hospital, Dr Anne Miller examined the content and form of doctors' and nurses' communication during handover. ANZCA grant (2005).

• Blood pressure earcons. Blood pressure can be measured continously or intermittently. Dr Marcus Watson developed visual and auditory display concepts for blood pressure monitoring that have undergone empirical testing since 2003. UQ Research Development Grant, UQ (2003)

• Company Commander Intelligent Agents for Synthetic Environments.  Applying Cognitive Work Analysis to model company commander’s decision making with a view to implementing the model into agents using JACK^TM (Agent Oriented language). The work was conducted by Dr Marcus Watson in collaboration with Dr Frank Lui of DSTO's Land Operations Division of DSTO. Research Agreement with DSTO (2001-2002)

• MacSHAPA and ESDA, 2002-2006. MacSHAPA is a software tool for video analysis originally developed between 1988 and 1998. MacSHAPA supports the use of behavioral, statistical, cognitive, and ethnographic traditions in the analysis of observational data (an area we call Exploratory Sequential Data Analysis or ESDA). MacSHAPA was originally funded by NASA-Ames, Wright Patterson AFB, DSTO, and University of Illinois. After 2002 MacSHAPA was maintained through a combination of end-user contributions and gifts administered by the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. More details available on our MacSHAPA page.

  MacSHAPA. Upgrading of MacSHAPA video analysis tool to an open source version (OpenSHAPA) is under way. See http://www.openshapa.org/.