Cognitive ergonomics: Extravagance or mandatory functional safety requirement

60% to 80% of all critical incidents during the use of automobiles can be ascribed to human behaviour (Schaub, 2017). The question about human failures is ubiquitous after traffic accidents, but the human behaviour is not only a safety risk: it is an even larger factor for more safety. Also, in 60% to 80% of all technical failures in automotive systems, the human behaviour is responsible for the recovery of the safe state bevor a critical situation arises (Schaub, 2017). The main subjects of cognitive ergonomics are the human behaviour and how humans individually react to different tasks and situations, while interacting with technical systems (e. g. automobiles, aircrafts, trains). Research activities in terms of cognitive ergonomics follow up with the design of human-machine interfaces with respect to the diversity of processes in human behaviour and human information processing (Smith & Hoffman, 2018). In accordance with ISO 26262-2:2018, the Functional Safety lifecycle of the automotive product development process roughly considers the human behaviour in the so-called controllability. controllability is one of three dimensions of the description and quantification of potential risks and hazards and quantifies the ability of the driver to control a failure and recover a save state (ISO 26262-2:2018). Due to the unclear derivation as well as the missing link to underlying cognitive processes of drivers, the definition of controllability is not sufficient enough to allow its comprehensive description and rating in the analysis of automotive systems.