Modelling Human Recovery of Errors

Tjerk W. van der Schaaf, Eindhoven University of Technology.

This presentation will highlight the positive role that human operators often appear to play in dealing with the day-to-day, small failures and errors, by preventing them from developing into major disturbances or even system breakdowns. The resulting "near-miss" situations may, when systematically registered and properly analysed, provide system designers and process managers with an insight into a possibly powerful alternative to (human) error PREVENTION, namely that of (human) recovery PROMOTION.

Theoretical approaches to modelling error recovery are briefly discussed and translated into initial research questions. These are partly answered by a number of small empirical pilot studies, and further illustrated by the first joint Failure/Recovery incident database, in a Dutch chemical process plant.

The main tentative conclusions are that error recovery is much more than just simple luck or coincidence, that its root causes can be identified, and that the resulting insight into recovery mechanisms may imply design changes for the technical and organisational context of the human operator's task in the future.

For more information contact: T.W.v.d.Schaaf@tm.tue.nl