The inspiration for this textbook was provided by many of the delegates attending the first IEE residential course Human Factors for Engineers . The initial success of this course has led to it becoming an established event and it is now held biennially, alternating with the IEE Conference Series People in Control . Both of these events are organised by the Executive Team of the IEE Human Factors Engineering Professional Network, for which the editors of this textbook are Chair and Co-Chair respectively. The delegates at the residential course provided feedback that suggested an introductory Human Factors textbook for systems engineers would be a valuable adjunct to the course; this book is the result of those suggestions and is planned to be amongst the supplementary reference texts for the course.

As the title suggests, this book has been written primarily, but not exclusively, for engineers of all backgrounds and disciplines. It provides a practical introduction to Human Factors targeted at a range of specialisations, including practising systems engineers, engineering managers, project managers, safety engineers and also engineering students from undergraduate to postgraduate level. Following the publication, towards the end of 2002, of the International Standard on Systems Engineering (BS ISO 15288) we believe that this book will provide engineers and other equipment acquisition stakeholders with practical advice and examples for the successful integration of human factors issues into the Systems Engineering life cycle.

We have endeavoured to provide an underpinning of theoretical knowledge together with some pragmatic design guidance, and each of...