Industrial lighting covers a wide range of different characteristics of working interiors and work tasks. This study investigated the effects of illumination on visual workload in visual display terminal (VDT) workstation. Ten college students (5 males and 5 females) were recruited as participants to perform VDT signal detection tasks. A randomized block design was utilized with four light colors (red, blue, green and white), two ambient illumination levels (20 lux and 340 lux), with the subject as the block. The dependent variables were the change of critical fusion frequency (CFF), visual acuity, reaction time of targets detection, error rates, and rating scores in a subjective questionnaire. The study results showed that both visual acuity and the subjective visual fatigue were significantly affected by the color of light. The illumination had significant effect on CFF threshold change and reaction time. Subjects prefer to perform VDT task under blue and white lights than green and red. Based on these findings, the study discusses and suggests ways of color lighting and ambient illumination to promote operators' visual performance and prevent visual fatigue effectively.

Human performance on color discrimination in visual display terminals may be affected by illuminant colors, the level of ambient illumination and background colors of the monitor. Few studies have focused on this topic. This study investigated human color discrimination ability in a simulated control room. Ten subjects were recruited as participants to perform a series of experimental tasks. A complete factorial (2 × 3 × 3) within-subject design was used. The independent variables were three illuminant colors (red, blue, and white), two ambient illumination levels (50 lux and 300 lux), and three background colors (black, blue and brown); the three dependent variables were the color discrimination ability (error scores), completion time and subject preference. The results showed that the illuminant colors and the screen background colors both significantly influenced human color discrimination ability (p<0.01). The result of this research can be used in control room design when considering the effect of color.

The trackball has been widely employed as a control/command input device on moving vehicles, but few studies have explored the effects of platform motion on its manipulation. Fewer still have considered this issue in designing the user interface and the arrangement of console location and orientation simultaneously. This work describes an experiment carried out to investigate the performance of trackball users on a simple point-and-click task in a motion simulator. By varying the orientation of onscreen targets, the effect of cursor movement direction on performance is investigated. The results indicate that the platform motion and target orientation both significantly affect the time required to point and click, but not the accuracy of target selection. The movement times were considerably longer under rolling and pitching motions and for targets located along the diagonal axes of the interface. Subjective evaluations carried out by the participants agree with these objective results. These findings could be used to optimise console and graphical menu design for use on maritime vessels. STATEMENT OF RELEVANCE: In military situations, matters of life or death may be decided in milliseconds. Any delay or error in classification and identification will thus affect the safety of the ship and its crew. This study demonstrates that performance of manipulating a trackball is affected by the platform motion and target orientation. The results of the present study can guide the arrangement of consoles and the design of trackball-based graphical user interfaces on maritime vessels.

IntroductionIn order to gain business profit, a safety and health management system is indispensable to the enterprise. Hayes et al. 1) indicated that the safe management practice carried out by the supervisor was the most predictable index to the satisfaction of employee. Thompson et al. 2) further explained the model of how the management affected the work safety by the safety culture and the management's support to the safety. But few of these researches focused on the topic of semi-conductor industry safety and health management. The semi-conductor industry is a very important key in the development of Taiwan's science and technology industries, so this study focuses on the field of semi-conductor industry in Taiwan, hoping to find out the significant factors of the safety and health management in this area.With the fast development of semi-conductor industry in Taiwan, Taiwan has already caught up with the advanced countries in the manufacturing process ability of the semi-conductor industry. However, the related safety and health management technique was not progressing simultaneously, which causing a lot of major accidents happened in the past few years. The purpose of this research is to construct a frame of semiconductor industry safety and health management system, and with questionnaires and on-the-spot interviews, to find out the main factors of safety and health management system in semi-conductor industry. Then an in-depth interview was executed to find out the safety and health management problems in the semiconductor industry. The investigation domains are based on the most intensive and particularly important area of semi-conductor industry in Taiwan