Reddit reviews Set Phasers on Stun: And Other True Tales of Design, Technology, and Human Error

It actually happened in radiation treatments of a cancer patient and killed him. It's a classic example in human factors classes when you are studying CS.

http://www.amazon.com/Set-Phasers-Stun-Design-Technology/dp/0963617885

Good book and important story.

Agreed, awesome article that details the importance and consequences of human factors and safety standards. I highly recommend the book 'Set Phasers to Stun' that collects examples of design and engineering oversight.

This probably isn't the most helpful answer, but any resources I might have used to learn the fundamentals myself are probably pretty outdated now. Honestly I'd just try to find highly rated books on Amazon that are reasonably priced. I haven't read this one for psych research methods, but looking through the table of contents, it covers a lot of what I'd expect (ethics, validity and reliability, study design and common methods) and according to the reviews it's clear, concise, and has good stats info in the appendix. I had a similar "handbook" style textbook in undergrad that I liked. For practicing stats, I'm personally more of a learn-by-doing kind of person, and there are some free courses out there like this one from Khan Academy that covers the basics fairly well.

But if you can, take courses in college as electives! Chances are you'll have a few to fill (or maybe audit some if you can't get credit), so go outside of HCDE's offerings to get some complementary skills in research or design. I usually find classrooms to be more engaging than trying to get through a textbook at home on my own, and especially for psych research methods, you'll probably have a project that gives you hands-on experience doing research with human subjects (most likely your peers). There are lots of free online courses out there as well if you aren't able to take them for credit.

You guys are making me miss school.

Getting specifically into UX self-study, in addition to a UX-specific research methods book (this is a newer version of one I read in school) I'd also go through the UX classics like Don Norman's The Design of Everyday Things and Emotional Design, Krug's Don't Make Me Think, and Casey's Set Phasers on Stun (this last one being more of a fun read than a practical one).

I know it sounds weird to you, but if you read "the design or everyday things" by Don Norman, you will encounter this idea.

The idea that products that you fail to use or make you feel stupid are bad designs and not "operator error."

It's a commonly held belief by designers and it makes more sense than you might think initially.

EDIT: another book even more relevant: this one is just stories of how people died because of bad designs https://www.amazon.com/Set-Phasers-Stun-Design-Technology/dp/0963617885

Things like this remind me of "...and, last but not least, Set Phasers on Stun, the tragic tale of a medical patient who meets his fate beneath a poorly designed radiotherapy machine in Texas."

Sometimes, I wish I didn't know how the sausage is made.

Set phasers on stun is the staple human factors book and exemplifies why proper ux is so important to product design.

https://www.amazon.com/Set-Phasers-Stun-Design-Technology/dp/0963617885

Oh my god I didn't realize some of those designs were actually out in the wild. Some of those are just terrible...asking for trouble. I already pasted a link to this book, but it's just so damn relevant.

https://www.amazon.com/Set-Phasers-Stun-Design-Technology/dp/0963617885

I'd check out Don Norman's writings, maybe starting with Design of Everyday Things (AKA The psychology of Everyday Things).

Other books that lead you closer to Human Factors might be books like Set Phasers on Stun: or reading about the various HF Societies

A truly excellent book. It was one of the textbooks for my Human Factors classes in college.

EDIT: a link

> Even in a hospital setting we have very little scope for changing the settings on our machines, and there are unbuilt failsafes to prevent overexposures.

Really? You should read http://www.amazon.co.uk/Set-Phasers-Stun-Design-Technology/dp/0963617885