Human relations mistakes

The categorization set out in Figure 2.6 is a broad classification of the causes of human failures that can be related to the SRK concepts discussed in the last section. The issue of violations will be addressed later in Section 2.7.1.1. The distinction between slips and mistakes was first made by Norman (1981). 

One mistake which Wilkinson urges us to avoid is to picture human characteristics as having evolved in relation only to a physical environment one of the primary hostile forces has always been other human beings. The importance of social interactions should not be underestimated. One example that he gives is that blood pressure tends to rise when people are interviewed by a higher- rather by than an equal- or lower-status interviewer. This is fundamentally a response of the sympathetic nervous system to the social anxiety induced by interacting with someone who is of higher social status. 

It should be understood that whatever the sample preparation protocol selected, the metabolic content will be modified to an extent. It is now recognized that the assessment of the extent of metabolome modification due to sample preparation is important and a number of publications have dealt with the effects of such manipulations when applied to different samples of human or plant origin (12,15-19). If such measures are not taken, a possibility exists to mistake biases introduced because of the sample preparation method for trends related to the study (as opposed to real effects originating from the standpoint of pathophysiology, biology, or investigator intervention). 

My sole point is to make it absolutely clear that the tolerance used in the field to assess residue exposure actually relates to a safe or no-effect level, and not a level that means toxicity or disease will ensue. These are the tolerances discussed in Chapter 3 and used to determine the violations tabulated in Table 3.1. Secondly, there are numerous safety or uncertainty factors built into the determination of these tolerances that account for mistakes the use of animals rather than humans or exposure to sensitive populations. Third, these tolerances mean lifetime consumption at these levels. Consuming a few apples at a detectable but subtolerance level should not be construed by any individual as being harmful To state so is simply to lie ... 

The concept of subsystem process is related to the concept of role used in social science. Organization theory usually emphasizes the fimctional requirements of the system which the subsystem fulfills, rather than the specific characteristics of the component or components that make up the subsystem. The typical view is that an organization specifies clearly defined roles (or component processes) and human beings fill them. But it is a mistake not to recognize that characteristics of the component—in this case the person carrying out the role—also influence what occurs. A role is more than simple social position, a position in some social space which is occupied. It involves interaction, adjustments between the component and the system. It is a multiple concept, referring to the demands upon the component by the system, to the internal adjustment processes of the component, and to how the component functions in meeting the system s requirements. The adjustments it makes are frequently compromises between the requirements of the component and the requirements of the system. 

Table 2.4 shows the iron contents in a number of food products. Among vegetables, spinach contains a relatively high amount of iron, but it is by no means outstanding. From 1935, it is also known that the human body can utilize very little of the metal because of the oxalic acid (—>4.15) in spinach. The authors of the related scientific publication actually made a funny reference to Popeye, but they did not say that Popeye ate spinach because of iron, and also did not mention the alleged mistake with the decimal separator. 

These are the eirors or violations that led directly to the incident. They are typically associated with personnel having direct contact with the equipment, such as operators or maintenance personnel. They are always committed actively (someone did or did not do something) and have a direct relation with the incident. For most of the time, however, the defences built into our operations prevent these human errors from causing harm. Individual/team actions within the ICAM model are initially categorized into intended or unintended actions and then categorized as slips, lapses, mistakes or violations. 

Reason [2] indicates that human error is intimately related to the concept of "intent . Error is only a meaningfiil term when lied to intended (plamied) actions that fiiil to achieve the desired goal without the intervention of some chance or unforeseeable agency. Thus, non-intentional, involuntary and spontaneous actions are not errors. Reason identifies two basic types of error sups and mistakes. 

It is worth noting, here, that this categorisation and plication of attributes relates primarily to Reason s behavioural and contextual levels of human error classification (i.e. it indicates the fiictors likely to lead to errors of a particular type (slips, lapses or mistakes)), but does not address the conceptual level of error classification, which is concerned with cognitive mechanisms involved in error production. 

Random hardware faults or systematic design errors - e.g. in software - or human mistakes shall not result in a malfunction of a safety related unit/system with the potential... 

Discussion of and research into human error focusses on slips, mistakes, incidents and accidents and their internal and external mechanisms. Research on accident liability centers on work- or traffic-related accidents emphasizing personal variables as an explanation of the occurrence of accidents. Systems variables such as workplace design or work environment are not considered systematically. Modern human factors approaches examine the joint effects of personal, organizational and technical factors on human reliability, employing accident-independent as well as accident-centered safety analysis methods. 

These classifications of human interactions can be related to a simple error classification system consisting of three categories (1) slips, (2) non-response, and (3) mistakes. This classification scheme can then be used to qualitatively incorporate human errors in accident scenarios. Table 9.1 provides generic human error probabilities for use in accident scenario... 

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