Lessons learned from the PISC III study of the influence on human factors on inspection reliability

Results from the PISC II Programme suggested that differences existed between manual inspectors in terms of their skills, knowledge and working practices which could exert a significant influence on the reliability on an inspection. Therefore, a programme of work on human reliability studies was initiated in the PISC III Programme as Action 7, with the objectives of studying and identifying causes of variability in inspection activities, and identifying some of the factors influencing the reliability of inspection in industrial conditions. It was foreseen that the information from Action 7 would aid in the development of methods for reducing the incidence of human error in inspection activities. This paper gives a brief summary of the programme and describes the lessons learned as a result of the work. A considerably more detailed description of the work is available as a PISC report. 3 refs, 3 figs