Fatigue study : $b the elimination of humanity's greatest unnecessary waste. A first step in motion studyGilbreth, Lillian Moller
Science
Fatigue study : $b the elimination of humanity's greatest unnecessary waste. A first step in motion study
Gilbreth, Lillian Moller
Fatigue; Industrial efficiency; Motion study
We have also the means. The psychologists and physiologists who
have measured fatigue rely almost solely upon output as the unit of
measurement. Decrease in output in a comparable unit of time, and all
other working conditions remaining the same, is taken as indicative
of being the result of fatigue. The observed man who is measured may
add introspections, he may tell how he feels while working and at
the close of work; but this testimony of his, while interesting and
worthy to be recorded with the other data, cannot be submitted to the
accurate measurement of the observer. In applying fatigue measurement
to the industries in the same way that we measure activity and what
it produces, we try to discover at the same time the condition of
the worker by his own accounts as to how he feels. We have not only
conditions under which scientific observations can be made and a
method of making them, we have also devices for measuring both
activity and output and relative rate of output.
Fatigue, a Test of Efficient Activity.
As for the relation between fatigue and activity, practically all of
our knowledge of fatigue is derived from our knowledge of the activity
that produces it. We measure the activity itself, and its product. We
then measure the interval of time that elapses before the organism has
gained enough activity to perform the same work in the same amount of
time and with the same results. A study such as this cannot extend over
a short space of time only. It must be carried on until any fatigue
that is accumulated shows itself; but it is simply a question of
extending the time over which the experiment stretches, and of varying
the length of rest periods until the desired information is recorded
in the data. As we come to compare various activities and their
results, we find that the fatigue is a measurement of the efficiency
of the activity. If two methods of doing the same piece of work take
the same amount of time and produce the same amount of output, and
if the interval needed to recover from the second is longer than that
needed to recover from the first, then, other conditions being equal,
the first method is the more efficient. A close study of the variables
that affect the two methods will be necessary to show exactly why the
first method is more efficient than the second, but the excess fatigue
certainly shows that it is more efficient.
Fatigue can, then, be looked at in two ways:
1. As a product of doing work.
2. As a test of efficiency in doing work.
The amount of work done and the product are affected by various
elements which affect the activity.
The Activity.
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