Search for: All records

Level of automation (LoA) is increasingly recognized as an important principle in improving manufacturing strategies. However, many automation decisions are made without formally assessing LoA and can be made based on a host of organizational factors, like varied mental models used by managers in decision-making. In this study, respondents (N = 186) were asked to watch five different assembly tasks being completed in an automotive manufacturing environment, and then identify “how automated” or “how manual” they perceived the task to be. Responses were given using a visual analogue scale (VAS) and sliding scale, where possible responses ranged from 0 (totally manual) to 100 (totally automated). The activity explored how and when individuals recognized the automated technologies being employed in each task. The tasks of the videos varied primarily by whether the human played active or passive role in the process. Focus group comments collected as a part of the study show how rating patterns revealed functional systems-level thinking and a focus on cognitive automation in manufacturing. While the video ratings generally followed the LoA framework discussed, slight departures in the rating of each video were found. 

Requirements play a pivotal role within the engineering design process as they provide parameters and guidelines, as well as defining the success of a project. While there is significant research that explores how to elicit requirements, there is little experimental exploration of how engineers prioritize requirements based on the stakeholder sources for the requirements. Non- technical factors may affect the prioritization of the requirements. A user study was conducted with sixty- six third year mechanical engineering undergraduate students participating in the experiment. Each student was provided two design problems with a requirements document for each. For one of the requirement documents, participants were also provided information on the stakeholder owner of the requirement (sources). Although all of the requirement sources affected the weight given to requirements – typically in the positive direction – it is found that the source had a statistically significant influence on perceived criticality for only 25% of the requirement cases. To conclude, the sources did prove to affect the prioritization of the requirements. Future work will explore how the sources influence requirements based on different typologies, such constraints versus criteria, or requirements with and without numerical targets.