Improving Student Performance and Engagement via the Human side of Engineering: Human Systems Engineering Education

对于能够解决工程与人类行为交叉领域的复杂问题的工程师的需求日益增长。其中许多问题影响到国家的广泛经济、国防、公共卫生和社会福利。例如，美国国家工程院的一项重大工程挑战是“确保网络空间的安全”。潜在的工程解决方案包括更好的硬件、传感器和安全的编程语言。然而，美国国家工程院也直接针对“计算机用户的心理”，包括“人们如何与计算机、互联网和一般的信息文化互动”，以及“导致蓄意计算机犯罪的心理学和社会学”。人类系统工程的教育、培训和教学将心理学和工程学相结合，旨在培养未来的工程师更好地解决人类的需求、目标、能力和局限性。这种方法最终将导致工程系统和解决方案功能更强、更可用、更有同理心、更有社会参与性。项目活动将包括：(1)分析学生项目如何融入以人为本的原则；(2)开发和测试将心理学融入项目工程课程的课程；(3)对人类系统工程入门课程和学生对工程学、心理学、课程作业和职业的看法进行纵向评估。第一和第二项活动的发现将揭示以人为本的工程原则，这些原则可能在学生的项目中被忽视，并为人类系统工程教学提供关键目标。第二项活动将开始测试教学资源以填补这些空白。这项工作将首先确定特定的例子、场景和问题，这些例子、场景和问题既可以告知工程专业的学生，也可以吸引他们。随后，研究人员将生成免费的、经过实地测试的教学模块，帮助学生理解心理学和工程学的综合。第三项活动的结果将阐明学生对心理学在工程中的作用的看法，揭示教授以人为本原则的新方法，并可能有助于提高学生的参与度和保留率。这项活动还将适应和验证一种新的基于调查的对工程和工程职业的看法的测量，该测量考虑到人类系统工程的概念和主题。所有材料和调查结果将通过一个鼓励社区讨论的互动网站发布。

There is a growing need for engineers who can solve complex problems at the intersection of engineering and human behavior. Many of these problems affect the broad economic, defense, public health, and social well-being of the nation. For example, one of the National Academy of Engineering Grand Challenges for Engineering is to "secure cyberspace." Potential engineering solutions include better hardware, sensors, and secure programming languages. However, the National Academy of Engineering also directly targets "the psychology of computer users," including "how people interact with their computers, with the Internet, and with the information culture in general" as well as the "psychology and sociology that leads to deliberate computer crime." Human Systems Engineering education, training and instruction that integrates psychology and engineering, is hypothesized to prepare future engineers to better address human needs, goals, capabilities, and limitations. This approach is expected to ultimately result in engineered systems and solutions that are more functional, usable, empathic, and socially-engaged.Project activities will include: (1) analyses of how student projects incorporate human-centered principles; (2) development and testing of lessons that infuse psychology into project-based engineering courses; and (3) a longitudinal evaluation of an introductory Human Systems Engineering course and students' perceptions of engineering, psychology, coursework, and careers. Findings from the first and second activities will reveal human-centered engineering principles that may otherwise be ignored in students' projects, and which offer critical targets for human systems engineering instruction. The second activity will begin to test instructional resources for filling those gaps. This effort will first identify particular examples, scenarios, and problems that can both inform and engage engineering students. Subsequently, researchers will generate free, field-tested, instructional modules that help students understand the synthesis of psychology and engineering. Findings from the third activity will shed light on students' beliefs about the role of psychology in engineering, reveal new ways to teach human-centered principles, and may contribute to better student engagement and retention. This activity will also adapt and validate a new survey-based measure of perceptions of engineering and engineering careers that takes into account Human Systems Engineering concepts and themes. All materials and findings will be disseminated via an interactive website that encourages community discussion.