Class of 2012 Abstract / Specific Aims: To explore whether publishing requirements for human-centered randomized control trials, particularly the CONSORT criteria, have any relationship to impact as measured by the Journal Citation Reports TM Impact Factor. Methods: A worksheet was used to evaluate a methodically selected list of journals, including types of articles published, requirements of authors for human-focused randomized control trials, JCR Impact Factor and other JCR metrics for each specific journal title. A worksheet was filled out for each journal by each member of the research team and answers combined for consensus. Group means and SDs were calculated and the Student’s t-Test applied to values for selected journals. Main Results: 50 candidate pharmacy journals were identified and 41 met the criteria for publishing human-centered randomized control trials. Journals were grouped according to whether they required CONSORT or had other reporting requirements for human RCTs, or had no requirements for such studies. Few (6; 15%) pharmacy journals required authors to use CONSORT; and additional 15 (37%) journals provided as least some author guidelines similar to CONSORT. Pharmacy journals using CONSORT or other guidelines had a higher average impact factor (3.5; SD = 1.5) than did journals without guidelines (2.4; SD = 0.9; p = 0.007). Conclusions: There appears to be a statistical difference in average JCR metrics between journals which require specific RCT guidelines and those which do not. The use of reporting guidelines, such as CONSORT, by pharmacy journals is associated with increased impact as represented by JCR influence measures.

In humanoid robotics, there is a long pursuit of making bipeds capable of walking in highly unstructured and roughly sensed environments. Within this goal, our objective is to develop a compliant bipedal humanoid robot, based on McKibben pneumatic actuators that can move in these terrains as well as quickly adapt to unpredicted variations on the contact state. We present here the first part of our work, focusing on the design, construction and control of a pneumatic robotic joint capable of achieving the control performance necessary for responding compliantly and accurately to contact transitions while delivering high forces needed to handle the physical challenges associated with rough terrains. In particular, we address our progress in the mechanical and embedded electronic design, actuator modeling, and compliant control strategies for a robotic joint based on fluidic pneumatic artificial muscles (PAMs). The proposed robotic joint has been validated experimentally, exploring various aspects of its performance as well as its shortcomings, but overall demonstrating the potential benefits of using pneumatic muscles. / text

Ein standardisiertes Vorgehen erleichtert die Anwendung von KI-Modellen in der Praxis, auch durch Mitarbeitende ohne erweiterte KI-Kenntnisse, bspw. Prozessexperten, die dem Thema „Künstliche Intelligenz“ (KI) oftmals unbedarft oder skeptisch gegenüberstehen (im Folgenden: KI-Laien). Im Kontext von industriellen Fertigungsprozessen ist daher ein geordnetes Vorgehen wichtig, dass auch KI-Laien ermöglicht, Methoden der künstlichen Intelligenz erfolgreich auf ihre Prozessdaten anzuwenden. Wir skizzieren einen Ordnungsrahmen für diesen Typ von Problemstellungen, der im Rahmen von Abschlussarbeiten und in Zusammenarbeit von Hochschulen mit ROBUR Automation entstanden ist. Er stellt den Zusammenhang zwischen den einzelnen Schritten her und gewährt somit einen Überblick über die komplexe Modellierung, der sich auch KI-Laien erschließt. Der Ordnungsrahmen als abstraktes Konzept findet seine Umsetzung in einem Framework. Im Beitrag fokussieren wir uns auf einen Baustein des Ordnungsrahmens, die Darstellung von Qualität. Dieser und weitere bilden gesamthaft eine pipeline, die in die von ROBUR Automation entwickelte Datenplattform Mia integriert wird.

Författarna till detta arbete fick en förfrågan från den pedagogiska utvecklaren på Storvreta förskoleenhet om att förverkliga ett utav Uppsala kommuns sju rumskoncept. Rumskoncepten är ett led i Uppsala kommuns strävan efter att skapa så likvärdig utbildning som möjligt på alla kommunala förskolor. Denna rapport beskriver den process som författarna genomgick i skapandet av en utforskande sandmiljö inomhus på en förskola. I skapandet av den upplevelseprototyp som placerades på den aktuella förskolan utgick författarna dels ifrån Ett förståelsefördjupande dokument om lärmiljöer, men även från de tankar och idéer som Uppdragsgivare och Användare framförde. Det arbetssätt som författarna valde att använda för att utveckla prototypen var en Human-Centered design. Hela processen mynnade ut i en upplevelseprototyp som bestod av två kubformade byggkonstruktioner med tillhörande stationer, där sand var det centrala materialet. Stationerna syftade till att främja ett utforskande och undersökande arbetssätt. Det sociokulturella perspektivet på lärande samt den konstruktionistiska teoribildningen har genomsyrat hela arbetet. Den upplevelseprototyp som blev resultatet av processen utvärderades med hjälp utav intervjuer med Användarna där det framkom att lärmiljön uppfyllde de syften som var uppsatta för detta arbete. Den lärmiljö som författarna placerade på förskolan är endast ett sätt att lösa den uppgift författarna fick, men den kan förhoppningsvis inspirera andra till att utveckla lärmiljöer som främjar ett utforskade och undersökande arbetssätt.

Social accounts of technological change make the flexibility and openness of interpretations the starting point of an argument against technological determinism. They suggest that technological change unfolds in the semantic domain, but they focus on the social processes around the interpretations of new technologies, and do not address the conceptual processes of change in interpretations. The dissertation presents an empirically grounded case study of the design process of an open-source online software platform based on the framework of distributed cognition to argue that the cognitive perspective is needed for understanding innovation in software, because it allows us to describe the reflexive and expansive contribution of conceptual processes to new software and the significance of professional epistemic practices in framing the direction of innovation. The framework of distributed cognition brings the social and cognitive perspectives together on account of its understanding of conceptual processes as distributed over time, among people, and between humans and artifacts. The dissertation argues that an evolving open-source software landscape became translated into the open-ended local design space of a new software project in a process of infrastructural implosion, and the design space prompted participants to outline and pursue epistemic strategies of sense-making and learning about the contexts of use. The result was a process of conceptual modeling, which resulted in a conceptually novel user interface. Prototyping professional practices of user-centered design lent directionality to this conceptual process in terms of a focus on individual activities with the user interface. Social approaches to software design under the broad umbrella of human-centered computing have been seeking to inform the design on the basis of empirical contributions about a social context. The analysis has shown that empirical engagement with the contexts of use followed from conceptual modeling, and concern about real world contexts was aligned with the user-centered direction that design was taking. I also point out a social-technical gap in the design process in connection with the repeated performance challenges that the platform was facing, and describe the possibility of a social-technical imagination.

京都大学 / 0048 / 新制・課程博士 / 博士(工学) / 甲第20378号 / 工博第4315号 / 新制||工||1668(附属図書館) / 京都大学大学院工学研究科電気工学専攻 / (主査)教授 小山田 耕二, 教授 川上 養一, 教授 中村 裕一 / 学位規則第4条第1項該当 / Doctor of Philosophy (Engineering) / Kyoto University / DFAM

Frequent and effective design evaluation is foundational to the success of any product development effort. Products used, installed, or otherwise handled by humans would benefit from an evaluation of the product while formally considering both the physical embodiment of the technology, termed technology, and the steps a user should take to use that technology, termed tactics. Formal and simultaneous evaluations of both technology and tactics are not widespread in the product design literature. Although informal evaluation methods have advantages, formal methods are also known to be effective. In this paper we propose a formal method for evaluating tactics and technology simultaneously. Unlike the published literature, this evaluation involves explicitly defined tactics in the form of a written description of the actor, environment, and series of steps. It also involves the use of stage-appropriate, explicitly defined tactics-dependent criteria, which include criteria from a broad range of impact categories, such as impacts on the user, environment, project, and technology.

As the population increases the demand for food also increases. It is estimated that the population will reach over 8.5 billion by the year 2050. The farming industry is pooling resources to increase food production by developing indoor farming. This practice of growing food indoors can attend to the food security issue which is a positive development in the long run. Indoor farming has been developing over the years and the purpose of the project will be an exploration of how indoor farming is affecting the people who grow these crops, i.e., the indoor farmers. The focus of the project is to understand what are the challenges and pain points of an indoor farmer, in the whole growing process. The human-centered design process is opted in this project to conduct the user studies. The user studies use methodological triangulation which includes in-depth interviews, surveys, and additional methods to gain a deeper understanding of the farmers’ perspective. Three Journey maps are created out of which one journey isused to identify the pain points in the growing process. The insights generated from the qualitative analysis are quantified to determine what the farmers’ daily activities look like, and their challenges during the growing process. On the basis of these insights, two concepts are created to offer solutions to improve the farmer’s experience. User tests determine that the solutions were desirable but should be quantified to check the validity. The research questions and future work are discussed further.

Human-building relationships impact everyone in industrialized society. We spend approximately 90% of our lives in the built environment. Buildings have a large impact on the environment; consuming 20% of worldwide energy (40% of U.S. energy) annually. Buildings are complex systems, yet architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) professionals often perform their work without considering the human factors that affect the operational performance of the building system. The AEC industry currently employs a linear design and delivery approach, lacking verified performance standards and real-time feedback once a certificate of occupancy is issued. We rely on static monthly utility bills that lag and mask occupant behavior. We rely on lawsuits and anecdotal business development trends as our feedback mechanisms for the evaluation of a complex, system-based product. The omission of human factors in the design and delivery of high performance building systems creates risk for the AEC industry. Neglecting an iterative, human-centered design approach inhibits our ability to relinquish the building industry's position as the top energy consuming sector. Therefore, this research aims to explore, identify, and propose optimizations to critical human-building relationships in the multifamily housing system. This work is grounded in Sociotechnical Systems theory (STS). STS provides the most appropriate theoretical construct for this work because 1) human-building interactions (HBI) are fundamentally, human-technology interactions, 2) understanding HBI will improve total system performance, and 3) the interrelationships among human-building subsystems and the potential for interventions to effect the dynamics of the system are not currently well understood. STS was developed in the 1940's as a result of work system design changes with coal mining in the United Kingdom. STS consists of four subsystems and provides a theoretical framework to approach the joint optimization of complex social and technical problems. In the context of this work, multidisciplinary approaches were leveraged from human factors engineering and building construction to explore relationships among the four STS subsystems. An exploratory case study transformed the work from theoretical construct toward an applied STS model. Data are gathered from each STS subsystem using a mixed-methods research design. Methods include Systematic Review (SR), a descriptive case study of zero energy housing, and the Macroergonomics Analysis and Design (MEAD) of three builder-developers. This work contributes to bridging the bodies of knowledge between human factors engineering and the AEC industry. An output of this work is a framework and work system recommendations to produce human-centered, adaptive buildings. This work specifically examined the system inputs and outputs of multifamily housing in the United States. The findings are supportive of existing scientific society, government, and industry standards and goals. Relevant standards and goals include the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society (HFES) Macroergonomics and Environmental Design Technical Groups, International Energy Agency's Energy in Buildings ANNEX 79 Occupant Behavior-Centric Building Design and Operation, the U.S. Department of Energy's Building America Research to Market Plan and zero energy building goals of the American Society of Heating Refrigeration and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE). / Doctor of Philosophy / We spend approximately 90% of our lives in the built environment. Buildings have a large impact on the environment; consuming 20% of worldwide energy (40% of U.S. energy) annually. As we work to reduce energy use in buildings, new challenges have emerged. As buildings become more complex, the architecture, engineering, and construction industry (AEC) must adapt. The industry historically employs a linear design and delivery approach, lacking verified performance standards and real-time feedback once a certificate of occupancy is issued. We rely on static monthly utility bills that lag and mask occupant behavior. We rely on lawsuits and anecdotal business development trends as our feedback mechanisms for the evaluation of a complex, system-based product. The omission of human factors in the design and delivery of high-performance building systems creates risk for the industry and occupants. To better understand that risk, a comparative analysis of zero energy housing explores the relationship between humans and the buildings of the future. A second case study explores the work systems of builder-developers by using the Macroergonomic Analysis and Design method. The work reports risks and barriers in the system, as well as opportunities to create human-centered, adaptive housing. Specifically, this project enhances our understanding of 1) high performance housing, 2) their occupants, and 3) the builder-developers that produce high performance housing.

The purpose of this project is to improve parents experience in the NICU through design, technology, communication and storytelling. A series of shadowing appointments were conducted to gain empathy and a greater understanding of the environment the design would be in. Next 15 user interviews were conducted. The qualitative data was then analyzed and a needs analysis for the application was determined by identifying patterns in the qualitative data. The design then went through three phases of design, testing and iterating, before the final prototype was complete. This study found that design, technology and storytelling could improve communication and the experience of parents in the NICU. / Master of Fine Arts