A Design Contribution to Ergonomic PC Mice Development.

Developing new manual computer pointing devices abiding to the requirements set out in ergonomic product design literature necessitates joining contributions from several areas, including the ergonomic guidelines applicable to hand tool design, human-system interaction, and certain user characteristics such as anthropometric data. Computer mice are hand tools enabling the interaction with the computer, for use by people from both sexes and practically all ages. Moreover, the PC mouse's intensive usage is able to cause musculoskeletal disorders.

Usability Evaluation of Slanted Computer Mice.

Prevention of musculoskeletal disorders is supported by use of slanted rather than horizontal pointing devices, but user acceptance of the former may be compromised due to lower perceived ease of use. This study compares subjectively rated usability (N = 37) for three sizes of slanted computer mice and includes a horizontal small conventional device as a reference. For a random subset of the sample ( = 10), objective usability parameters were also elicited.

Dynamics of forearm muscle activity in slanted computer mice use.

Background: Static muscular activity of muscles activated in the use of the conventional PC mouse is believed to represent a higher risk for the musculoskeletal health of the user than dynamic muscular activity.

Objective: This paper presents a compounded muscular activity dynamics indicator (akin to percent relative range), enabling comparison between computer handheld pointing devices.

Methods: This muscular dynamism approach considers baseline muscular activity (APL, ECR, ECU and ED) relative to the Maximum Voluntary Contraction as well as the dynamics of muscular activation.

A tentative efficiency index for pointing device use in computer aided design: A pilot study.

Background: Focusing on the efficiency aspect of computer pointing devices' usability, this paper reports on a novel and tentative empirically derived efficiency index for 3D CAD.

Objective: Three commercially available computer pointing devices were compared: a standard horizontal computer mouse, a vertical device (supporting neutral pronation of the forearm) and a slanted device.

Methods: Pilot structured observations of 10 subjects' activity were carried out to estimate the proportion of each unique computer mouse operation during CAD modelling with a 3D parametric software.

Psychosocial and ergonomic survey of office and field jobs in a utility company.

Introduction: The effect of different kinds of work on the psychosocial assessment of workers under the same management and organizational environment is investigated.

Methods: A voluntary assessment in a utility company was carried out using the short version of the Copenhagen psychosocial questionnaire (CoPsoQ) on two occasions, 1.5 years apart.

Working conditions under multiple exposures: A cross-sectional study of private sector administrative workers.

Background: Office workers are increasingly exposed to physical and psychosocial risk factors.

Objective: To assess the association between environmental, physical and organizational working conditions and the physical and psychosocial well-being of a sample of private sector office workers.

Methods: Musculoskeletal pain was collected from a body map and the Disabilities of the Arms, Shoulders and Hands questionnaire.