Does the education given by the nation's human factors graduate training programs meet the skill and knowledge needs of today's employers? Can the supply of trained human factors specialists be expected to keep pace with the demand? What are the characteristics, employment settings, gender distribution, and salaries of human factors specialists?

These and other questions were posed by the committee as it designed mail-in and computer-aided telephone surveys used to query human factors specialists. The committee evaluates its findings and makes recommendations aimed at strengthening the profession of human factors.

This book will be useful to educators as an aid in evaluating their graduate training curricula, employers in working with graduate programs and enhancing staff opportunities for continuing education, and professionals in assessing their status in relation to their colleagues.

• Front Matter
• Summary
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Survey Methodology
• 3 Characteristics and Utilization of Human Factors Specialists
• 4 The Education of Human Factors Specialists
• 5 Supply and Demand of Human Factors Specialists
• 6 Conclusions and Recommendations
• References
• Appendices