The NRC Human Performance Test Facility: An Approach to Data Collection Using Novices and a Simplified Environment

In the spring of 2012, as part of a ‘hub and spoke’ model of research to address the human performance concerns related to current as well as new and advanced control room designs and operations, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) sponsored a project to procure a low cost simulator to empirically measure and study human performance aspects of control room operations. Using this simulator, the Human Factors and Reliability Branch (HFRB) in the Office of Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) began a program of research known as the NRC Human Performance Test Facility (HPTF) to collect empirical human performance data with the purpose of measuring and ultimately better understanding the various cognitive and physical elements that support safe control room operation. To accomplish this, HFRB first procured two 3-loop Westinghouse pressurized water reactor simulators with the capability to run a full range of power operation scenarios. HFRB staff work as co-investigators along with a team of researchers at the University of Central Florida (UCF) to design and carry-out a series of experiments aimed at measuring and understanding the human performance aspects of common control room tasks through the use of a variety of physiological and self-report metrics. The intent was to design experiments that balanced domain realism and laboratory control sufficiently to collect systematic, yet meaningful human performance data related to execution of common main control room (MCR) tasks. Investigators identified and defined three types of tasks that are examined in the present project: Checking, Detection, and Response Implementation. Task type presentation was partially counterbalanced to maintain ecologic validity with experimental control. A variety of subjective and physiological measures were used to understand performance of those tasks in terms of workload. The simulator used to collect these data was a digital representation of a generic analog NPP MCR interface. The data resulting from this experimentation enhances the current information gathering process, allowing for more robust technical bases to support regulatory guidance development and decision making. The present paper describes the approach behind this research effort.