Too smart for our own good
We have all heard that we should not "Cry Wolf" unless there is a real concern. I found this article that puts this common sense to a scientific test. Evidently it is typical human nature to subconsciously evaluate the relevancy of an alarm. This is exactly why we have brought the Blaxtair Pedestrian recognition system to the US market. Alarms that are relevant, reliable and trusted.
"Human probability matching behavior in response to alarms of varying reliability"
Abstract
The goals of this research were to substantiate the existence of the cry-wolf effect for alarm responses, quantifying its effect on operator performance. A total of 138 undergraduate students performed two blocks of a cognitively demanding psychomotor primary task; at the same time, they were presented with alarms of varying reliabilities (25, 50 and 75% true alarms) and urgencies (green, yellow and red visual alarms presented concurrently with low-, medium- and high-urgency auditory civilian aircraft cockpit alarms). Alarm response frequencies were observed and analysed, and /-tests and repeated-measures MANOVAs were used to assess the effects of increasing alarm reliability on alarm response frequencies, speed and accuracy. The results indicate that most subjects (about 90%) do not respond to all alarms but match their response rates to the expected probability of true alarms (probability matching). About 10% of the subjects responded in the extreme, utilizing an all-or-none strategy. Implications of these results for alarm design instruction and further research are discussed.
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00140139508925269#.VRqNAvnF-Sq
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1 个月Michael, thanks for sharing!
Senior Environmental, Health, and Safety Leader and Innovator
8 年My son, a junior in college has a friend who had front desk duty in her dorm yesterday when they initiated their annual fire drill. The alarms functioned properly...not one student evacuated the building!! This is a frightening editorial about the "Cry Wolf" problem I feel exists relative to alarms and proper response to them.
Retired
9 年Thanks for sharing!