Human Factors and Cognitive Engineering in Functional Safety Analysis

Human factors and cognitive engineering are considered nowadays as important multidisciplinary domains that focus on improving the relations between humans, technology and systems to be supervised and operated. The industrial automation and control systems (IACS) in hazardous plants are increasingly computerized and perform various safety functions. These are usually designed and implemented according to the functional safety requirements. The objective is to maintain high performance and productivity of the plant, and reduce risks related to identified hazards and threats. An approach is proposed to apply selected cognitive engineering methods for verifying the design of safety systems to be implemented in hazardous plant in context of defined safety functions, operator interfaces, procedures and other factors influencing risks.