Posture, discomfort and performance in a VDT task

Improvements in workplace, working posture, and discomfort need to be justi fied in terms of improvements in performance. Previously, a visual inspecti on task has been investigated. The objective of the current study was to de monstrate the interactions between workplace, work duration, discomfort, wo rking posture, as well as performance in a 2-h typing task. Three levels of keyboard heights were used to change working posture (e.g. joint angles an d postural shifts), and thus presumably discomfort (e.g. rating of perceive d discomfort and body part discomfort), and performance (e.g. typing speed, error rate and error correction rate). The results indicated that the hypo thesized posture-comfort-performance interrelationships were partially supp orted. Keyboard height had effects on working posture adopted. As in previo us studies, the rate of postural shift was a good indication of discomfort in a VDT task. Discomfort and postural shift rate had adverse effects on pe rformance (e.g. error rate). However, these effects on error rate may not b e strong.