European conference on cognitive ergonomics

Turnitin benefits
Turnitin is an anti-plagiarism detector that brings both disadvantages and benefits to users. The plagiarism tool helps instructors and tutors in universities check copied student essays. The foolproof plagiarism tool has sparked some legal controversy because the software itself gives the scanned research paper a score based on frequency of duplicate phrases found in the paper.

Catch those who cheat
Turnitin uses proprietary database for its extensive search on duplicate or copied content including analysis on public databases and websites. Although the software has been helping schools and universities catch students who copied content or cheated, it sparked controversy on the way the student’s efforts were being graded. Turnitin not only functions to find plagiarized sentences but also grades submitted research papers and essays for plagiarism check.

Unfair grading system
Universities subscribed to the service because it not only finds plagiarized sentences but also takes away the large amount of time and efforts spent by instructors to read and grade papers. One of the options is for students to submit their essays to the service for plagiarism detection and evaluation. The instructors normally upload the essays to the service directly. The students may upload their research papers through the University’s WebCT or webpage.

The plagiarism checker process
The software compares the student’s submitted essays first with their collection of essays within their database. Next, the software then runs a comparison across search engines. Lastly, the software grades the research paper according to the percent dupe or frequency of similar phrases.

How do you think a student trying to get good grades would feel about this?
Most students feel that their efforts in making a good paper is not being evaluated fairly. Just imagine making good research and putting quality content but the paper would only be graded based on percent dupe. Although the system practically helps instructors to spot copied phrases, it does not motivate students to perform in their writing assignments.

Traditionally Ergonomics is known as “fitting systems to humans” which translates out to using tools, equipment, tasks and environments to suit certain human cognitive abilities and take into account human limitations. To simply this we only have to look at an example such as designing a keyboard that maximizes our ability to type accurately and at speed or creating the ultimate race car that fits a driver. The goal of cognitive ergonomics is to limit human error when dealing with often complex machines and user interfaces.
Article by: lgmobile5.com – LG cell phones

Almost 50 students were divided in to 4 groups and asked to participate in three tests to measure the effectiveness of a low cost NVG training simulator. The tests were comprised mostly of image testing and object recognition. The studies showed that a Night Vision Goggle simulator was a viable option for NVG testing compared to the expensive NVG units themselves. The digital images in the simulator were promising and accurate enough for training situations.

The military has thrown together 20 participants in a military planning exercise to see what the situation awareness reposed would end up being. Participants were measured based on three different techniques: a freeze probe technique, a post trial subjective rating technique, and a critical incident technique interview approach. Finding suggested that only the first freeze probe or SAGAT technique played a big factor in the statistical analysis. The others had no effect in the outcome of the trials.

The Swedish Accident Investigation Board has found some flaws in the current accident reporting and recommendation systems and is conducting research on how to fix these issues. Three of the investigators have been trying out new techniques with the way accident reporting is conducted. They have been graded on effectiveness using a cost and benefit analysis which seems to be the greatest factor in it all. In the end they report that there should be more emphasis on safety maturity, open lines of communication and the cost / benefit values of each case.