It’s now widely recognised of the effects of acute sleep loss on cognitive performance. Comparisons between sustained wakefulness (i.e. acute sleep loss) and blood alcohol impairment have been made, finding simple reaction time are impaired to similar degrees after around the 20 h mark (see below from Maruff et al. 2005 – source in links).… Continue reading The insidious and sustained dangers of sleep loss

This study analysed trends in incident reporting over a 5-year period; specifically exploring the number and types of recommendations resulting from investigations. >16k patient safety incident reports were analysed. The authors provide a brief overview of some incident reporting challenges/issues in healthcare. Results The number of incident reports was found to have increased over the… Continue reading Problems with incident reporting – Reports lead rarely to recommendations

ABSTRACT Night-shift workers are at high risk of drowsiness-related motor vehicle crashes as a result of circadian disruption and sleep restriction. However, the impact of actual night-shift work on measures of drowsiness and driving performance while operating a real motor vehicle remains unknown. Sixteen night-shift workers completed two 2-h daytime driving sessions on a closed… Continue reading High risk of near-crash driving events following night-shift work

I found this an interesting comparison between the “asymmetry of signals”, that is, the asymmetry between the feedback we have for observing, monitoring and measuring efficiency versus safety. Source below. The asymmetry is characterised by: 1. Safety measures often being indirect and “noisy” compared to efficiency goal feedback. 2. Successful efficiency is generally more reinforcing… Continue reading The asymmetry of safety/efficiency signals

This study is really cool. It explored journalists’ language in their reporting of the US political campaign trail and what their word choices reveal about their cognitive mindsets – namely drawing on the system 1 / system 2 thinking concept and anchoring heuristic. Journalists’ twitter posts were compared against newspaper articles and broadcasts (>220k articles,… Continue reading Anchoring in the past, tweeting from the present – Cognitive bias in journalists’ word choices

“Falling asleep whilst driving: are drivers aware of prior sleepiness?” There’s newer work in this area and it’s a simulator study (which has limitations) but this was a nice study which, for me, drove home the importance and danger of sleepiness while driving (p1). As you can see from the second image – tired driving… Continue reading Mini-post: “Falling asleep whilst driving: are drivers aware of prior sleepiness?”

This explored whether performance variability is necessary for tree fallers to safely fell trees. 22 fellers were included in the study. Whether you buy in to the resilience perspectives or not, or rightly so challenge the state of evidence, it’s still an interesting discussion around the interactions of expertise, context and formal safety systems. Forestry… Continue reading Is Performance Variability Necessary? A Qualitative Study on Cognitive Resilience in Forestry Work

ABSTRACT This paper outlines the importance of ambiguity in organizations that manage hazardous operations in a rapidly changing environment. Three kinds of ambiguity are described: fundamental ambiguity in categories and labels for understanding what is happening; causal ambiguity for understanding cause–effect relationships that enable explanation, prediction, and intervention; and role ambiguity of agreeing on responsibilities.… Continue reading Making Sense of Ambiguity through Dialogue and Collaborative Action

“Gimme fuel, gimme fire, gimme that which I desire” said Metallica. Or maybe if you want to prioritise a performance goal or change initiative, like critical risk observations, incident reporting, learning teams, work insights, pre-task discussions etc, remove the frictions more than adding extra fuel? I love the #hiddenbrain podcast with Shankar Vedantam, and they ran a… Continue reading Mini-post: Fuel and frictions of organisational change

An interesting meta-analysis of the evidence around sleep disturbances and insomnia on the risk of suicidal thoughts and behaviours (STBs). 44 studies met inclusion criteria out of about 1k studies. They found that “sleep disturbance, including insomnia, appears to be prospectively predictive of  STBs, with small-to-medium to medium effect sizes for these associations” (p13). Further,… Continue reading Mini-post: Sleep and suicide: A systematic review and meta-analysis of longitudinal studies