Examples of Recent Applied Experimental Work 661research and development efforts, particularly in support of
such projects as the Intelligent Transportation Systems Pro-
gram. On the basis of these developments, continued growth
can be expected in the application of psychological research
methods and data to national driver-highway-system prob-
lems (Bloomfield et al., 1995; Kantowitz et al., 1997).
In this and the preceding section we have focused on re-
search relating to aviation and highway safety. We should
note that although most of the psychological work pertaining
to transportation safety has in fact dealt with airspace opera-
tions or highway traffic, work has also been done on rail and
maritime safety as well. Multiple-fatality accidents have oc-
curred with disturbing frequency in both contexts, and human
error has often been implicated as the major causal factor
(Secretary of State for Transport, 1989; Wilson, 1992). Ship
disasters claiming the lives of 200 or more people are not
uncommon; the World Almanac(1998) lists twelve such inci-
dents between 1981 and 1997. It seems clear that transporta-
tion safety will deserve the attention of applied researchers
for the foreseeable future.
Medicine and Health
Both the rapid increase in the elderly population and the con-
stant development of new medicines and technological
devices for use in outpatient treatment of various types of ill-
nesses and impairments have motivated concern among psy-
chologists regarding the adequacy of the design of medical
devices from a user’s point of view (Klatzky & Ayoub, 1995).
Devices that are intended to be used by people without med-
ical training in the home need to be designed not only so that
they serve the function that they are intended to serve when
properly used, but also so that proper use is easy, the possi-
bility of incorrect use is minimized, and the consequences are
not disastrous when the latter occurs. The question of what
can be done through training to help people who are chroni-
cally ill cope more effectively with their medical problems
has stimulated some research (McWilliam et al., 1999).
The identification of factors that influence the likelihood
that people will voluntarily get medical examinations or take
disease-prevention measures has been the focus of some
experimentation (Chapman, & Coups, 1999; Chapman &
Sonnenberg, 2000; Klatzky & Messick, 1995; Klatzky,
Messick, & Loftus, 1992). Efforts have been made to deter-
mine the relative effectiveness of various methods of pro-
moting self-examination and participation in medical screen-
ing for skin cancer (Mickler, Rodrigue, & Lescano, 1999),
prostate cancer (Davidson, Kirk, Degner, & Hassard, 1999),
and breast and cervical cancer (Holden, Moore, & Holiday,
1998), among other diseases.
Interest in the question of how to design and deliver mes-
sages that will motivate health maintenance and illness-
prevention activities has stimulated experimental work
(Wright, 1999). Some researchers have found that health
messages are likely to be more effective in evoking risk-
reducing behavior changes if tailored to meet recipients’
individual needs than if presented in more generic form
(Kreuter, Bull, Clark, & Oswald, 1999); others have begun to
explore the possibility of applying computer technology to
the production of such individually tailored messages
(DeVries & Brug, 1999; Dijkstra & DeVries, 1999).
Human error has been mentioned several times already as
a focus of experimental work in various contexts. Interest in
the subject stems in large part from the fact that such errors
can have severe consequences, as when they lead to indus-
trial accidents, airplane crashes, or train wrecks (Reason,
1990; Senders & Moray, 1991; D. D. Woods & Cook, 1999).
Notable among the contexts in which such human error has
been studied are transportation and process control; recently,
however, much attention has been focused on human error in
medical contexts. Although errors that occur in the operating
room—as when a surgeon performs the right operation on the
wrong limb—are likely to get more press than those that
occur in more mundane settings, serious consequences
can occur when medicine is misprescribed, interactions
among medicines are overlooked, a prescription is misread,
printed instructions are misunderstood, or medications are not
taken as prescribed. Identifying the various types of medical
errors that occur and finding ways to eliminate them or de-
crease their frequency of occurrence have become important
objectives for experimental research (Bogner, 1994).Sensory, Motor, and Cognitive Aids for Disabled PeopleThe number of people in the United States who have physical
or mental disabilities that constitute serious impediments to
employment or daily living is not known precisely but is un-
questionably large. Elkind (1990) has estimated that about
40% of the 30% of the U.S. population that reports having
some type of disability (i.e., about 12% of the entire popula-
tion) has a disability that can be considered severe. A 1997 re-
port of the U.S. Census Bureau gives a lower figure (19.7%)
as the percentage of the U.S. population with some level of
disability, but essentially the same (12.3%) as the percentage
having a severe disability. The 1999 Statistical Abstract(U.S.
Census Bureau, 1999, Table 627) gives about 17 million as
the number of people between 16 and 64 years of age with
“work disability,” which is about 10% of the population in
this age group. This figure is also consistent with the earlier
estimates if we assume that the percentage of children with