Digital Human Modeling for Workspace Design

Digital human modeling (DHM) technology offers human factors/ergonomics specialists the promise of an efficient means to simulate a large variety of ergonomics issues early in the design of products and manufacturing workstations. It rests on the premise that most products and manufacturing work settings are specified and designed by using sophisticated computer-aided design (CAD) systems. By integrating a computer-rendered avatar (or hominoid) and the CAD-rendered graphics of a prospective workspace, one can simulate issues regarding who can fit, reach, see, manipulate, and so on. In this chapter, I briefly describe the development of various DHM methods to improve CAD systems. Past concerns about early DHM methods are discussed, followed by a description of some of the recent major developments that represent attempts by various groups to address the early concerns. In this latter context, methods are described for using anthropometric databases to ensure that population shape and size are well modeled. Efforts to integrate various biomechanical models into DHM systems also are described, followed by a section that outlines how human motions are being modeled in different DHM systems. In a final section, I discuss recent work to merge cognitive models of human performance with DHM models of manual tasks. Much has been accomplished in recent years to make digital human models more useful and effective in resolving ergonomics issues during the design of products and manufacturing processes, but much remains to be learned and applied in this rapidly evolving aspect of ergonomics.