Cyber-physical production system (CPPS) is being envisioned as the fourth major paradigm shift in the way industrial production happens. This chapter argues that though information technology-enabled automation will be used in CPPS, human intervention for production supervision would be required especially in critical scenario and human cognitive load would continue to affect the industry efficiency. The complexity of HCI-based control panel design would increase in CPPS due to task complexities and type of information presented through HCI systems. Also, the design methodologies for HCI systems have remained mostly technology centric and have not been able to include the cognitive load measurement caused by the design as a necessary consideration in the design process. Therefore, this chapter proposes user's cognitive load centric methodology for HCI based control panel design in context of CPPS. Cognitive load measurement should become a pivot for the HCI design process. In support of that, this chapter presents a case study using proposed UCLCD4 methodology.
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Human beings were not satisfied with the nature given tools for achieving their purpose hence they started creating their own tools. As the man-made tools evolved and became more sophisticated they started demanding greater learning, attention and expertise. New age tools demand more training beforehand and more effort during their usage. Simple tools evolved into complicated computing machines with time. Several continuous and disruptive changes in manufacturing industry have marked the history of these man-made tools (Astrom, 1985). As the complications of tools have increased with each change, tools have become more demanding to human beings at cognitive level (Wittenberg, C., 2015).
Advent of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in manufacturing industry influences the working profile of the factory operators (MacDougall, 2014). With increase in use of ICT, workload of the factory operator will increasingly have shifted from physical to cognitive. Manufacturing industry is about to undergo a cyber-revolution which will further consume more of human’s cognitive power than their physical power during industrial operations (MacDougall, 2014). Such a shift will be happened due to the use of digitally networked computing machines which manage the robots to help reduce manufacturing time, increases the quality and improve productivity (Lee, Bagheri, & Kao, 2014). Increase in cognitive load due to task complexity has caused increase in human errors, time on task, attention & stress (Cain, 2007; Wittenberg C., 2015).
Authors posit here that as the cognitive load caused by decision making tasks using new computing systems are increasing. Therefore, there is a need for greater precision in measurement of the cognitive load as the information complexity and criticality of tasks are increasing. The human interface design process for the control panels will now have to focus on objective measurements of cognitive loads in order to ensure cognitive efficiency in new control panel designs for ‘smart factories’.
Therefore, there is a need of user cognitive load centric methodology for control panel design especially in context of fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0). This chapter argues for a new methodology and proposes a User Centred Design (UCD) focus on Cognitive Load (CL) measurement called as User’s Cognitive Load Centric Design for Industry 4.0 (UCLCD4).