| Abstract: | I would like to comment on the remarks of Peters and Seminara (Amer. Psychologist, 1957, 12, 751-752) on the use of the term "Human Engineering." When, in the United Kingdom, a group was formed nine years ago as an interdisciplinary society for the study of human work and working environment, we spent many months in discussion on what we should call this integrated area. We came to the conclusion that a new word would have to be coined for reasons that are given in this article. After study of possible roots, the name "Ergonomics" was decided upon (gr. ergos = work; nomos = natural laws) as the noun, which gives "ergonomic" as the adjective and "ergonomist" as the practitioner. It is readily usable in other European languages such as French (ergonomie) and has now come into fairly general use in Europe. The author explains how the group decided on this term. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved) |
