Using a Situational Q‐Sort to Assess Perceptions of a Food Recall Message as a Function of Delivery via Social,Organizational or Traditional Media

Behavior in response to a crisis will result from a combination of individual and situational variables. In spite of the increased recognition of the importance of situational variables, a literature and methodological toolkit for the study of situational influences that is comparable with those available for individual variables has not yet emerged. However, the recently developed Riverside Situational Q‐sort provides a novel method for quantifying subjective impressions of any situation. This proof‐of‐concept demonstration asked participants to complete the RSQ in response to an imaginary food crisis situation communicated via one of three message sources (social media, organizational website and traditional media). Results illustrate the potential of this method to provide quantitative evaluations of subjective responses to crisis situations.     

Human error and commercial aviation accidents: an analysis using the human factors analysis and classification system

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this study was to extend previous examinations of aviation accidents to include specific aircrew, environmental, supervisory, and organizational factors associated with two types of commercial aviation (air carrier and commuter/ on-demand) accidents using the Human Factors Analysis and Classification System (HFACS). BACKGROUND: HFACS is a theoretically based tool for investigating and analyzing human error associated with accidents and incidents. Previous research has shown that HFACS can be reliably used to identify human factors trends associated with military and general aviation accidents. METHOD: Using data obtained from both the National Transportation Safety Board and the Federal Aviation Administration, 6 pilot-raters classified aircrew, supervisory, organizational, and environmental causal factors associated with 1020 commercial aviation accidents that occurred over a 13-year period. RESULTS: The majority of accident causal factors were attributed to aircrew and the environment, with decidedly fewer associated with supervisory and organizational causes. Comparisons were made between HFACS causal categories and traditional situational variables such as visual conditions, injury severity, and regional differences. CONCLUSION: These data will provide support for the continuation, modification, and/or development of interventions aimed at commercial aviation safety. APPLICATION: HFACS provides a tool for assessing human factors associated with accidents and incidents.     

A situation model to support awareness in collaborative design

The concept of awareness was introduced to underline the importance of shared knowledge and enhance collaborative work. Actors require much knowledge about their work situation and their collaborators’ activities in order to complete their own activities successfully. This paper first contributes to a detailed literature review about the concept of awareness. This review helps to identify key awareness-related requirements for the development of collaborative systems. The second contribution is related to the proposal of a generic situation model that is based on the concept of entities, interactions and specific roles. This new conceptual framework intends to favor situation awareness and support shared representations. It concerns both technical and organizational design activities and describes the collaborative situations from multiple views and at different organizational levels (project, team and individual). The proposal's interest and its feasibility for use in the development of collaborative systems are demonstrated by instances related to a case study and by analyzing the potential satisfaction of the identified awareness-related requirements. To sum up, the paper offers a synthesis of key context-related concepts and a generic model for the representation of collaborative situations to increase awareness.     

基于证据理论物联网安全态势感知方法研究

社会物联网技术迅速发展,安全问题日益严重,对简便易用的物联网安全态势感知方法进行了研究。针对当前物联网安全态势感知系统缺乏通用性、过分依赖专家知识的缺点,提出了一种基于改进D-S证据理论的物联网安全态势感知方法。利用模糊高斯隶属函数计算漏洞信息隶属度矩阵,归一化后作为证据分布矩阵;利用改进Topsis方法衡量证据可信度,聚合两两证据间的局部可信度,根据态势评估场景改进期望正负解向量,充分抑制冲突性证据可信度,提高相互支持证据间可信度,利用加权平均方法进行漏洞信息融合得到态势评估结果;基于时间因子折扣和高危漏洞比例折扣证据理论融合形成态势感知结果,利用时间因子聚合多个态势评估数据,根据时间尺度对不同时刻的态势评估证据进行折扣,越接近当前时刻的证据折扣度越小,反之越大。同时,综合考虑不同时刻物联网漏洞信息,利用高危漏洞比例信息进行自适应动态加权,把不同时刻的高危信息折扣入识别框架,系统的危险变化信息集中体现在证据融合过程中。经过实验表明,在不同数量证据体融合和4种常见冲突证据融合中,改进Topsis方法对可信命题的融合概率更高;在态势评估方面,准确评估当前系统危险程度;在态势感知方面,折扣...     

Situational computing: An innovative architecture with imprecise reasoning

Situation awareness is introduced as a more holistic variant of context awareness where situations are regarded as logically aggregated pieces of context. Situational computing can be viewed as the pervasive computing paradigm that deals with situational context representation and reasoning. One important problem that arises in such paradigm is the imperfect observations (e.g., sensor readings) that lead to the estimation of the current user situation. Hence, the knowledge upon which the context/situation aware paradigm is built is rather vague. To deal with this shortcoming, we propose the use of Fuzzy Logic theory with the purpose of determining (inferring) and reasoning about the current situation of the involved user. We elaborate on the architectural model that enables the system to assume actions autonomously according to previous user reactions and current situation. The captured, imperfect contextual information is matched against pre-developed situation ontologies in order to approximately infer the current user context. Finally, we present a series of experimental results that provide evidence on the flexible, efficient nature of the proposed situational computing.     

A contemporary view of organizational safety: variability and interactions of organizational processes

Studies of qualitative assessment of organizational processes (e.g., safety audits and performance indicators) and their incorporation into risk models have been based on a ‘normative view’ that decomposes organizations into separate processes that are likely to fail and lead to accidents. This paper discusses a control theoretic framework of organizational safety that views accidents as a result of performance variability of human behaviors and organizational processes whose complex interactions and coincidences lead to adverse events. Safety-related tasks managed by organizational processes are examined from the perspective of complexity and coupling. This allows safety analysts to look deeper into the complex interactions of organizational processes and how these may remain hidden or migrate toward unsafe boundaries. A taxonomy of variability of organizational processes is proposed and challenges in managing adaptability are discussed. The proposed framework can be used for studying interactions between organizational processes, changes of priorities over time, delays in effects, reinforcing influences, and long-term changes of processes. These dynamic organizational interactions are visualized with the use of system dynamics. The framework can provide a new basis for modeling organizational factors in risk analysis, analyzing accidents and designing safety reporting systems.     

基于改进Apriori的网络安全感知方法

针对网络安全态势评估过程中存在数据源单一、实时性不强、准确率不高的问题,提出一种基于改进关联规则算法(Apriori算法)的网络安全态势感知方法;通过对数据的分析,发现在网络中存在关于安全态势的关联规则;通过网络攻击影响熵值序列的分析,对关联规则进行分类为空间正常和异常空间,进而对关联规则进行聚类分析;根据聚类后的规则划分网络安全态势等级;将改进后的算法应用到网络安全态势感知当中,实验结果表明,该方法满足了网络安全危险预警和实时监控的要求;改进的算法用于安全态势感知是可行的、有效的。     

Implicit social cognition and safety culture

Most models define safety culture as basic assumptions, attitudes, or values concerning organizational safety issues. When measuring safety cultures, many researchers have had their main focus on explicit safety‐critical attitudes and generally relied on specific survey instruments. It is questionable, however, whether self‐report measures can capture all aspects of organizational safety culture. Instead of getting direct answers, implicit measures rely on activating automatic attitudes derived from long‐term memory and measure the time it takes an individual to react to attitude‐evoking stimuli. This article deals with the relationship between implicit safety‐critical attitudes and safety culture. The first study involved the measurement of explicit and implicit safety‐critical attitudes from 376 participants working in various industries. The Implicit Association Test (IAT)—a latency‐based measurement approach—was applied to assess implicit safety‐critical attitudes. Explicit safety attitudes were measured by questionnaire. Implicit and explicit attitudes are both related to organizational safety performance indicators, such as data concerning accidents and near misses. The second study involved both types of safety‐critical attitudes that were used for predicting safety culture indicators on an individual level. An example of this is risk awareness. The first study's results show that explicit and implicit safety‐critical attitudes represent various aspects of an organizational safety culture and can be related to safety performance indicators on an organizational level. The second study's results indicate that implicitly measured attitudes have been better at predicting safety culture indicators on an individual level compared to explicit attitude. Recommendations for future research in the field of safety culture assessment are made. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Appropriateness of communications media use in organizations: situation requirements and media characteristics

The purpose of this paper is to examine media use in organizations as affected by situation requirements and media characteristics. This paper discusses the strength of four existing models describing communications media use in individuals and organizations. The paper also presents research which evaluated interactions of multiple situation variables affecting communications media appropriateness in a survey population. Participants rated die acceptability of each of twelve communications media in each of eight hypothetical organizational situations. Situations varied based on high or low levels of three factors: message urgency, amount of message content, and distance between communicators. Results indicated (1) situations have unique and significant contributions to media appropriateness; (2) appropriateness of media usage depends on the match between situation requirements and media characteristics, and (3) situation effects are more salient in some 'situation-dependent' media. Another survey of 1072 voice mail users confirmed die validity and reliability of these results.     

Experimentarium as arena for common learning during change processes

The initiating question guiding this study is how employee participation can be established during an organizational change process in order to improve the employees' involvement in the design of their future work environment. A case study in which an “experimentarium” (learning lab) was conducted in a medium‐size Danish company is presented. The case study demonstrates that it is feasible to generate employee participation in designing their future working environment in the experimentarium when careful attention is given to the influence of situational factors and the pedagogical methods utilized are chosen carefully to suit the various learning situations through the process. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.     

A prospective study of maintenance deviations using HFACS-ME

The factors initiating aviation accidents are usually hidden behind various steps, systems, and tasks, and systematic root-cause analysis is required to uncover the initial factor(s). To reduce the risk of unfavourable events, it is more appropriate to study their causal factors. We argue that an in-depth study on maintenance process deviations could assist in uncovering hidden causal factors. We therefore analyse reported maintenance deviations from an aviation organisation using the Human Factor Analysis and Classification System-Maintenance Extension (HFACS-ME) taxonomy to aggregate and map hidden causal factors. We find attention and memory errors and inadequacy of processes and documentation are major causal factors. We argue a well-run organisation can capture hidden causal factors and reduce the risk of incidents and accidents. More specifically, we show how situation awareness (SA) interventions can assist in the mitigation of maintenance deviations and capture hidden causal factors.     

基于图像的无人机战场态势感知技术综述

在对态势感知的相关论述进行参考的基础上,对态势感知的相关概念进行了分析。根据态势感知典型3个阶段的特征,重点考虑了基于图像的无人机战场侦察应用特点,分别对态势觉察、态势理解、态势预测的内涵和关键技术进行了论述,为今后无人机战场态势感知技术实现提供参考,同时也为其他侦察系统提供相应的借鉴。     

Situational variables in online versus offline channel choice

Since the advent and rapid diffusion of the Internet, the subject of consumer channel choice has attracted a large amount of research, mainly focused on the influence of channel, consumer and product category characteristics as its drivers. The interaction between channel choice and the purchase situation has been largely ignored, however. This paper is an attempt to fill this gap by identifying the key purchase situation variables and conducting an experiment to assess their impact on the choice between the traditional retail outlet and the online store. The results show that the key determinants of channel choice relate to time and distance. Distance-to-store and time pressures are among the factors affecting the probability of online purchase. Using a conceptual framework to explore differences in the impact of situational variables across product categories (high/low involvement, search/experience good), we show that distance-to-store has more influence on the likelihood of online purchase in situations involving search goods, while social variables are found to play a role only in the context of high-involvement goods.     

What influences IT ethical behavior intentions—planned behavior,reasoned action,perceived importance,or individual characteristics?

This study extends IT ethics research by proposing an IT ethical behavioral model that includes attitude, perceived importance, subjective norms, situational factors, and individual characteristics. The proposed model integrates elements from the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) and Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) as well as ethical decision-making models. It is hypothesized that behavioral intention is influenced by an individual’s attitude (which in turn is influenced by consequences of the action and the environment), obligation, and personal characteristics. The results of the study show that some factors are consistently significant in affecting attitude and behavioral intention. Other factors are significant only in certain scenarios. From the results, organizations may be able to develop realistic training programs for IT professionals and managers and incorporate deterrent and preventive measures that can curb the rising tide of undesired misuse.     

What influences IT ethical behavior intentions—planned behavior,reasoned action,perceived importance,or individual characteristics?

This study extends IT ethics research by proposing an IT ethical behavioral model that includes attitude, perceived importance, subjective norms, situational factors, and individual characteristics. The proposed model integrates elements from the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB) and Theory of Reasoned Action (TRA) as well as ethical decision-making models. It is hypothesized that behavioral intention is influenced by an individual’s attitude (which in turn is influenced by consequences of the action and the environment), obligation, and personal characteristics. The results of the study show that some factors are consistently significant in affecting attitude and behavioral intention. Other factors are significant only in certain scenarios. From the results, organizations may be able to develop realistic training programs for IT professionals and managers and incorporate deterrent and preventive measures that can curb the rising tide of undesired misuse.     

A path analysis model of individual variables predicting safety behavior and human error: The mediating effect of situation awareness

Situation awareness is often argued to be an indicator of safety performance. Several factors may influence situation awareness that need to be identified and analyzed. This study investigated the influence of some variables on safety performance and examined the mediating effect of situation awareness. This study was conducted on 601 workers of different industries in Iran. All variables were measured via a multi-sectional questionnaire in a self-report manner. Path analysis modeling was used for data analysis. To measure the validity of the model, the RMSEA, CFI, and R² coefficients were employed. The results revealed that safety knowledge and sleepiness had significant direct and indirect effects on safety behavior and human error. Fatigue had only a mediating effect on safety behavior and error via situation awareness. Safety locus of control had only a mediating effect on human error through situation awareness. Whereas better safety knowledge and an internal safety locus of control could boost siaituation awareness, daily sleepiness and fatigue had significant, detrimental effects on situation awareness. These variables explained 38% of the variations in situation awareness. A proportion of the effect of personal variables on safety behavior and human error was mediated by situation awareness; thus, situation awareness is the direct cause of some safe behaviors and human errors.     

Team situation awareness measure using semantic utility functions for supporting dynamic decision-making

Team decision-making is a remarkable feature in a complex dynamic decision environment, which can be supported by team situation awareness. In this paper, a team situation awareness measure (TSAM) method using a semantic utility function is proposed. The semantic utility function is used to clarify the semantics of qualitative information expressed in linguistic terms. The individual and team situation awareness are treated as linguistic possibility distributions on the potential decisions in a dynamic decision environment. In the TSAM method, team situation awareness is generated through reasoning and aggregating individual situation awareness based on a multi-level hierarchy mental model of the team. Individual and team mental models are composed of key drivers and significant variables. An illustrative example in telecoms customer churn prediction is given to explain the effectiveness and the main steps of the TSAM method.     

A Hybrid Model for Driver Route Choice Incorporating En-Route Attributes and Real-Time Information Effects

The en-route driver behavior problem under information provision is characterized by subjective and linguistic variables, in addition to situational factors. Fuzzy modeling provides a robust mechanism to capture subjectivity and/or the linguistic nature of the causal variables. This motivates the development of a hybrid en-route route choice model that combines quantitative and fuzzy variables to more robustly predict driver routing decisions under information provision. Simulation experiments are conducted to analyze the ability of the hybrid model to capture en-route driver behavior effects in the within-day and day-to-day contexts.     

Situation awareness measurement of an ecological interface designed to operator support during alarm floods

Alarm summary interfaces are lists of chronologically sorted alarms used in oil producing supervision programs for decades. When a great number of alarms are activated in a small interval of time – that is, an alarm flood – alarm summary ceases to be as useful to understand the process situation. New alarm systems and interfaces are necessary to support operators' decision when dealing with such alarm floods. Situational awareness is an important concept for process operators when making decisions. The application of Ecological Interface Design concepts can lead to better interface designs, especially in unanticipated situations. The aim of this work is to verify the usefulness of a new ecological alarm interface, called Advanced System of Intelligent Alarms (SAAI, the Portuguese acronym). SAAI displays alarms prioritised in real-time with relevant graphical information on process conditions. Professional operators' situational awareness is measured when using either the SAAI interface, or the alarm summary interface, connected to a dynamic simulator running a model of an oil production process. Measurement techniques used include objective and subjective rating approaches, and a proposed technique. Operators' situation awareness for SAAI interface has shown greater values under all techniques used, compared to alarm summary interface. Although the new interface implied that operators would have to look also at an extra monitor, results show that their situation awareness improved on average, and that situation awareness might be less impaired under alarm floods.Relevance to industrySituation awareness plays an important role in operators' decision-making process. Alarm systems are critical in complex process operation, and alarm floods may impair operators' decisions. A new alarm ecological interface designed to maintain operators' situational awareness under alarm floods may mean an improvement in operation safety and efficiency.     

A systems-theoretic approach to safety in software-intensive systems

Traditional accident models were devised to explain losses caused by failures of physical devices in relatively simple systems. They are less useful for explaining accidents in software-intensive systems and for nontechnical aspects of safety such as organizational culture and human decision-making. This paper describes how systems theory can be used to form new accident models that better explain system accidents (accidents arising from the interactions among components rather than individual component failure), software-related accidents, and the role of human decision-making. Such models consider the social and technical aspects of systems as one integrated process and may be useful for other emergent system properties such as security. The loss of a Milstar satellite being launched by a Titan/Centaur launch vehicle is used as an illustration of the approach.