Matt Sears, PhD

Past studies have used eye-tracking glasses to analyze people’s perception of visual stimuli, usually regarding wayfinding, safety, or visual appeal. Some industries, such as the automotive industry, studied the effects of visual stimuli on task completion. However, the architecture and construction industries have mainly conducted eye-tracking experiments with surveys or search tasks instead of performing a task. This paper uses eye-tracking glasses to analyze people’s perception of visual… Show more

Past studies have used eye-tracking glasses to analyze people’s perception of visual stimuli, usually regarding wayfinding, safety, or visual appeal. Some industries, such as the automotive industry, studied the effects of visual stimuli on task completion. However, the architecture and construction industries have mainly conducted eye-tracking experiments with surveys or search tasks instead of performing a task. This paper uses eye-tracking glasses to analyze people’s perception of visual stimuli while completing tangible tasks that simulate real-world applications. This research studies how people look at visual stimuli that influence their ability to interpret drawings with varying degrees of complexity, assess task completion performance, and inspect how people search for information. Twenty pipefitters wore eye-tracking glasses to record their eye movement patterns while completing a model pipe spool assembly. The eye-tracking glasses and Visual Eyes software measured visit metrics, fixations, fixation durations, convex hull coverage, assembly time, rework, and errors. Unlike previous studies, convex hull areas are calculated and used to measure search efficiency. This research found that people interacted more frequently with more complex visual stimuli but did not necessarily require more time to complete a task. People with lower search efficiency visited the drawings more frequently than people with higher search efficiency. People with higher search efficiency made fewer mistakes, redid less work, and completed tasks quicker than those with lower search efficiency. Search efficiency was found to be a good predictor of task performance. Show less

An extensive framework has been developed for studying the behavior of motor vehicle drivers using eye tracking technology. Previous work has revealed strong relationships between driver eye movements and performance, which has resulted in widely accepted guidance within the transportation industry. In this work, the same eye tracking analysis methods were applied to investigate 20 professional pipefitters’ interactions with traditional isometric assembly drawings during a construction pipe… Show more

An extensive framework has been developed for studying the behavior of motor vehicle drivers using eye tracking technology. Previous work has revealed strong relationships between driver eye movements and performance, which has resulted in widely accepted guidance within the transportation industry. In this work, the same eye tracking analysis methods were applied to investigate 20 professional pipefitters’ interactions with traditional isometric assembly drawings during a construction pipe model assembly task, in order to begin to understand the strategies that construction craft professionals use to gather visual information from engineering deliverables. A custom web application was developed to quantify and compare the pipefitters’ interactions with the assembly drawings through several visit metrics. Results indicated that the pipefitters’ interactions with the assembly drawings were associated with their performance and spatial cognition; however, the results did not suggest that the pipefitters were adhering to any particular visual information gathering strategies. The authors also investigated whether age or industry experience were associated with differences in visual information gathering strategies, but no significant relationships were observed. The primary contribution of this work is a demonstration of how existing eye tracking analysis methods can be applied to investigate how construction craft professionals extract visual information from engineering deliverables. Show less

Eye tracking glance analyses have been used to study the behavior of motor vehicle drivers for at least two decades and eye tracking is now emerging as an experimental protocol in construction research. Previous studies have identified relationships between driver glance behavior and performance, so existing motor vehicle driver glance analysis methods were applied to search for analogous relationships with construction craftworkers during a model assembly task. Eye tracking analysis… Show more

Eye tracking glance analyses have been used to study the behavior of motor vehicle drivers for at least two decades and eye tracking is now emerging as an experimental protocol in construction research. Previous studies have identified relationships between driver glance behavior and performance, so existing motor vehicle driver glance analysis methods were applied to search for analogous relationships with construction craftworkers during a model assembly task. Eye tracking analysis software vendors have yet to adopt standardized eye tracking event detection algorithms, and researchers have historically reported insufficient details to render most eye tracking analyses reproducible. As a result, the purpose of the present work is to address the gap in knowledge in understanding the challenges encountered as a result of a lack of standardization. The methodology applied existing glance analysis methods to a study incorporating mobile eye tracking glasses, which made the experimental environment less controlled than a typical glance analysis study using a screen-based eye tracking system, such as a motor vehicle driver behavior study. A new noise filtering parameter, maximum off-stimulus fixations, was also introduced. The results show that the absence of standardized eye tracking parameters, such as minimum fixation duration, can lead to different statistical results. The study's primary contribution to the body of knowledge is that is identifies the need for standardization of eye tracking analyses to better ensure that future eye tracking studies be more consistent and reproducible. Show less

Existing glance analysis methods were applied and expanded upon to develop an open-source eye tracking analysis web application, and the application was used to identify relationships between pipefitter demographics, experience, abilities, and performance. Initial efforts revealed that existing eye tracking glance analysis standards can lead to inconsistent results, so recommendations are provided for the further standardization of eye tracking glance/visit analyses. A new potential noise… Show more

Existing glance analysis methods were applied and expanded upon to develop an open-source eye tracking analysis web application, and the application was used to identify relationships between pipefitter demographics, experience, abilities, and performance. Initial efforts revealed that existing eye tracking glance analysis standards can lead to inconsistent results, so recommendations are provided for the further standardization of eye tracking glance/visit analyses. A new potential noise filtering parameter was introduced, maximum off-stimulus fixations, which could be incorporated into future studies. Convex hull coverages were also used to measure the efficiency in which the pipefitters were able to search for information within the drawings, and the complexity of visual information in the drawings was also quantified. Significant linear relationships were observed between information complexity and search efficiency, but the most noteworthy findings were the consistent relationships observed between the metrics of search efficiency and performance. The results suggest that future efforts could improve craftworker productivity by modifying 2D drawings or by training craftworkers to read 2D drawings in ways that improve their search efficiency. The eye tracking analysis application developed for this work has been made freely available, and this work concludes with many suggestions for future studies. Show less

Research Team DCC-01 (RT-DCC-01) developed a set of research roadmaps that, if implemented, would develop the knowledge and practices to double the productivity of the downstream and chemicals industrial construction sector. RT-DCC-01 spent one year following a scientific process to identify a series of research topics and then prioritize and organize them into research roadmaps. The team collected research topics through a series of workshops and interviews, inviting subject matter experts to… Show more

Research Team DCC-01 (RT-DCC-01) developed a set of research roadmaps that, if implemented, would develop the knowledge and practices to double the productivity of the downstream and chemicals industrial construction sector. RT-DCC-01 spent one year following a scientific process to identify a series of research topics and then prioritize and organize them into research roadmaps. The team collected research topics through a series of workshops and interviews, inviting subject matter experts to share how other industries have improved their processes. These subject matter experts were from a variety of fields, such as healthcare, neuroscience, computer science, and finance. Then the team prioritized and ranked topics with the help of a panel of industry experts and a Delphi approach. Finally, the team developed three research roadmaps from the highest-ranked research topics. These roadmaps offered different degrees of detail, but each included a timeframe that showed how it could be rolled out as a five-year program. Show less

Productivity of craft workers in construction projects can be negatively impacted by ineffective communication of the project’s design and information. Traditional delivery of mechanical, electrical, and piping (MEP) designs rely on two-dimensional isometric drawings. Developments in three-dimensional (3D) computer aided design (CAD) and 3D printing have provided new format options for delivering engineering information, however providing them to crafts for use at the construction workface… Show more

Productivity of craft workers in construction projects can be negatively impacted by ineffective communication of the project’s design and information. Traditional delivery of mechanical, electrical, and piping (MEP) designs rely on two-dimensional isometric drawings. Developments in three-dimensional (3D) computer aided design (CAD) and 3D printing have provided new format options for delivering engineering information, however providing them to crafts for use at the construction workface remains relatively rare. The objective of this research is to understand how eye gaze patterns of construction craft workers are influenced by information formats when completing complex spatial tasks. A series of field trials with MEP workers was conducted to examine the influence of information format on their eye gaze patterns in completing a scale model task assembly. Participants were provided eye tracking glasses with one of three information formats: traditional, two-dimensional (2D) isometric drawings; 2D isometric drawings supplemented with a three-dimensional (3D) image of the assembly; and 2D isometric drawings supplemented with a 3D physical model of the assembly. Eye gaze patterns were examined to understand if performance can be improved by alternative formats of information displays and/or training. Show less

Recent evidence indicates that construction workers fail to recognize many safety
hazards that arise during construction activities. Previous research has focused
hazard recognition skill but has not examined if the proportion of hazards viewed
correlates with hazard recognition performance. To study this topic 18 subjects were
fitted with mobile binocular eye tracking glasses, presented with a random sequence
of three photographs of construction work spaces, and asked to… Show more

Recent evidence indicates that construction workers fail to recognize many safety
hazards that arise during construction activities. Previous research has focused
hazard recognition skill but has not examined if the proportion of hazards viewed
correlates with hazard recognition performance. To study this topic 18 subjects were
fitted with mobile binocular eye tracking glasses, presented with a random sequence
of three photographs of construction work spaces, and asked to recognize all of the
safety hazards present in each photograph. Voice narrations and eye tracking data
were collected as participants identified hazards and were used to compare the
proportion of hazards viewed with the proportion of identified safety hazards. The
results reveal that there is no correlation between the proportion of fixations on
hazards and hazard recognition despite assumptions made in previous research.
This study departs from the current body of knowledge by providing a metric to
evaluate locational attentional fixation data and attempts to recognize the optimum
proportion of focused and distributed attention for obtaining an appropriate level of
situational awareness necessary for complex hazard recognition tasks. Show less

Engineering deliverables to construction craft workers have remained largely unchanged for a century. Black and white, 2D paper drawings are the primary medium by which engineering designs are communicated, but a certain level of experience is required in order for a craft worker to efficiently extract necessary information from a drawing. This work presents a novel method of visualizing and analyzing eye tracking data through the use of convex hull areas. Convex hull areas are proposed as a… Show more

Engineering deliverables to construction craft workers have remained largely unchanged for a century. Black and white, 2D paper drawings are the primary medium by which engineering designs are communicated, but a certain level of experience is required in order for a craft worker to efficiently extract necessary information from a drawing. This work presents a novel method of visualizing and analyzing eye tracking data through the use of convex hull areas. Convex hull areas are proposed as a metric for measuring the amount of information that a participant is processing from a drawing at a given instant in time.
Eye tracking data was collected in a previous study where 20 construction craft workers were tasked with assembling a PVC pipe assembly from traditional 2D isometric pipe spool drawings. Demographic data and spatial cognition data were also collected from each participant. In the present work, craft worker spatial cognition and years of construction experience were both shown to correlate with a craft worker’s average convex hull area. The authors developed software for producing animations of eye tracking data convex hull areas, but have only begun to assess the data produced from the convex hull analysis method. Average convex hull areas were analyzed in the present work, but several potential additional metrics are suggested. This study was severely limited by the small sample size of the previous study and further data collection is warranted to confirm the findings presented herein.
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