What Fatigue Study Is.
Our fatigue study is an attack upon this unnecessary waste of human energy. It is a careful consideration of the problem of activity from the side of its results upon the human organism. It aims:
1. To determine accurately what fatigue results from doing various types of work.
2. To eliminate all unnecessary fatigue.
3. To reduce the necessary fatigue to the lowest amount possible.
4. To provide all possible means for overcoming fatigue.
5. To put the facts obtained from the study into such form that every worker can use them for himself to get more out of life.
The Field of This Book.
The reader who will carefully watch the tired crowd of workers will probably decide that he would like to do something about the fatigue problem immediately. There are various methods by which he may attack the problem. He may, and must, ultimately, review the literature on fatigue. The work of Marey, of Amar, of Imbert, of Offner, of Thorndike, and of numerous other physiologists and psychologists lies open to the student of the subject. He may turn immediately to Miss Josephine Goldmark’s masterly volume on “Fatigue and Efficiency.” This will give him an insight into the application of fatigue elimination to the industries. He may decide, however, that such study must wait, and that he must actually do something to cut down the fatigue the first thing the next morning, while the driving force of what he has seen is still strong. Nothing can mean so much to what he is to do as the strong incentive that drives him to doing it, the desire to help. But he will do best if he is instructed and directed. He should plan, in order that he may do the most in the least amount of time, and do the big, easy, obvious things first.
This book will outline a method of attack, and furnish a working practice for attacking the fatigue problem in an industrial plant. This practice is recommended because it rests on the results of measurement. We have here not simply a collection of illustrations that show what has been done in eliminating fatigue in the industries. All fatigue elimination is to be commended, but illustrations that do not embody well-recognized principles are questionable models. It is easy to make external changes that never touch the underlying cause of evil. Worthwhile, permanent fatigue elimination goes at the fundamentals of the work itself, and studies these in relation to the fatigue. What has been done is worth while when we know how it has been done, and why it has been done. Given these facts, we can determine how it may be done again in the same fashion and possibly even better. The practice that is the result of accurate measurement,—this is the standard to be demanded.