Co-Designing Human Augmentation Technologies to Enhance Situational Awareness, Safety, and Operator-Machine Interaction in Complex Environments

Abstract

Maintaining situational awareness (SA) is critical for safe and effective interaction in complex environments where operators work near heavy machinery. SA is challenged by constrained spaces, limited visibility, high noise, and increasing automation, which can reduce operators’ understanding of machine behavior. Using a five-phase Research through Design approach grounded in Human-Centered Design, we investigated how human augmentation technologies (HATs) can support SA, safety, and operator–machine interaction in underground mining. Through field observations, a focus group interview, design artifacts, a co-design workshop, low-fidelity prototypes, and a validation workshop, we identified the importance of communicating machine operational state and motion intent during maintenance, testing, and troubleshooting tasks. We co-designed redundant multimodal wearable concepts and derived design guidelines for context-aware wearable HATs that support safe operator–machine interaction through anticipatory visual, auditory, and haptic feedback.