Artifacts and Coordination in High-Stake Environments
Speaker
Yan Xiao
Director of Human Factors & Technology Research, School of Medicine, University of Maryland
When
-
Where
Newell-Simon Hall 1305 (Michael Mauldin Auditorium)
Description
This presentation will first present a phenomenology of coordination in a high-stake environment: a trauma center. The intense task interdependency of team members calls for efficient and robust coordination mechanisms to counter uncertainly, rapidly changing environment. A focused study will then be described on one specific artifact: a large public display board made of white dry easel board. By exploiting the cognitive properties of the display board, such as storage and joint visual access, the teams improve the reliability of the joint cognitive system in terms of communication, memory, processing, and accessing. Based on the concept of display-based cognition, our analysis illustrates the role of public displays in facilitating negotiation of scheduling, joint planning, and augmenting inter-personal communication. The presentation concludes with a highlight of on-going studies on coordination and prototype development of hybrid, tangible user interface that extends the functionality of the whiteboard as a coordinative artifact.
Speaker's Bio
Yan Xiao directs the Human Factors & Technology Research at University of Maryland and is Principal Investigator of multiple projects over $3 million funded by federal agencies and Fortune 100 companies. Currently Yan is Associate Professor (tenured) of anesthesiology and information systems and a special member of faculty in School of Business, University of Maryland, College Park. Among his contributions are theories of collaborative work, designs of effective auditory alarms in healthcare and innovative designs of mobile telemedicine systems. His current work has been on the following three areas: a) understanding efficiency and patient safety issues in healthcare processes, b) establishing principles of utilizing new telecommunication technologies to improve efficiency of emergency medical care, and c) understanding coordination in highly dynamic situations using trauma resuscitation as a live laboratory. Major sponsors of his research include National Patient Safety Foundation, National Institutes of Health, National Science Foundation, Army Research Institute, and Nortel Networks. Yan enjoys woodworking, hiking, and traveling.
Host
Susan Fussell