Facilitating student learning about ergonomics and healthy computing skills via participatory ergonomics.

In general, K-12 students have little opportunity to control feedback from the various factors in their educational environments. However, leading theories of human-system interaction suggest participants in a system will perform better if they have some degree of control over their interaction with the design of the system's features. In an effort to provide an added degree of control to students in one high school while also attempting to address concerns about computer use-related musculoskeletal discomfort in students, an experiment was conducted with the goal of identifying effective means through which students could learn about healthy computing.

Towards development of a nonhuman primate model of carpal tunnel syndrome: performance of a voluntary, repetitive pinching task induces median mononeuropathy in Macaca fascicularis.

This study investigated changes in median sensory nerve conduction velocity (SNCV) over several weeks of exposure to a voluntary, moderately forceful, repetitive pinching task performed for food rewards by a small sample of young adult female monkeys (Macaca fascicularis). SNCV, derived from peak latency, decreased significantly in the working hands of three of the four subjects. The overall decline in NCV was 25%-31% from baseline.

Spinal loading during manual materials handling in a kneeling posture.

Stooped, restricted, kneeling, and other awkward postures adopted during manual materials handling have frequently been associated with LBP onset. However, lift assessment tools have focused on materials handling performed in an upright, or nearly upright standing posture. Unfortunately, many of the tools designed to analyze standing postures are not easily adapted to jobs requiring restricted postures.