Human factors engineering professionalized in the early years of the Cold War due to the development of safety-critical systems—those in which failures would be catastrophic. Often used interchangeably with ‘ergonomics,’ human factors engineering (HFE) not only considers physical comfort in the composition of objects and systems, but seeks to optimize human performance through strategic design principles drawn from psychology, cognitive science, and other fields. The origins of HFE are typically traced to Taylorism, but it was not until the Cold War era that the field became widely researched and implemented in a variety of areas. The American military long held interest in HFE. Earlier called ‘applied psychology’ or ‘human engineering,’ branches developed tactics to improve selection and training techniques; in later years, engineers applied research in the construction of weapons systems and command rooms. By the 1960s, largely due to Cold War imperatives and the development of new computing and communications technologies, many federal, company, and university laboratories were conducting HFE research in efforts to better understand man-machine interactions. NASA, an agency itself borne of the space race between the United States and Soviet Union, has been a key contributor to the development of human factors engineering. Along with pioneering biomedical studies necessary in determining how man would physically venture into space, NASA investigated how displays and controls needed to be placed aboard spacecraft so that astronauts would be best able to process complex information and complete tasks.
