FW-HTF-P: Building Human-Technology Safety Partnerships in Roadside Work Zones

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Highway construction and maintenance is reported as one of the most unsafe occupations in the United States. Road workers are six times more likely to be injured or killed during work, compared with other occupations. In the past two decades, more than 22,000 highway construction and maintenance workers have died due to work-related accidents, which translates to a societal cost of $55 million/year. Nevertheless, alerting a worker to an emergency in real-time is extremely difficult, as the work environment is noisy and chaotic, filled with visual distractions, heavy vibrations, and loud noises. Identifying threats and taking appropriate action is very challenging, especially when the time available to respond is very brief. This project explores the concept of using connected wearable technology to create smart work zones that would enhance workers' safety & comfort. This wearable device would assist workers in identifying and warning of potential threats/hazardous situations, give initial preemptive guidance, and help them find a way to safety. The research team aims 1) to provide virtual reality (VR)-based tools for training workers and 2) to provide agencies and contractors with guidelines for best practices for worker safety in the emerging sociotechnical landscape.A convergent research team of scientists, public/private stakeholders, and industry partners will (1) develop an initial prototype of connected wearable devices (Future Technology); (2) use VR experiments to investigate workers' behavior during hazardous events and safety-related decisions with and without wearable devices (Future Worker); and (3) develop a novel technology acceptance model and quantify the societal/economic benefits of this new human-technology safety partnership (Future Work). Successful project outcomes will be collated into a training-and-learning platform (SHIELD: the Science of Hazard Identification and Evasion for Laborers and Drivers), initiating a long-term research roadmap that will facilitate design choices for work zone safety technology. The SHIELD platform will provide realistic yet safe learning environments in which data on future workers' evasive behavior in various struck-by-hazard scenarios can be measured in order to inform the human-technology safety partnership. The VR training modules resulting from this project will improve the workers' mental model of the wearable device capabilities and overall situational awareness, thereby enabling workers and organizations to formulate new safety strategies afforded by the newly augmented physical capabilities. The scientific insights on learning and adaptation across a diverse range of workers will help make the technology designs more inclusive and effective and ensure equitable workforce diversification. The eventual aim is to make the SHIELD Platform scalable and transferable to several other work contexts with struck-by hazards, either by vehicles (e.g., fire respondents, towing, waste removal, roadside assistance, and law enforcement) or by falling or flying objects (e.g., mining, general construction, oil, and gas).This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.