Location: Las Cruces, New Mexico
Department: Psychology
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PROGRAM BACKGROUND
Title of program:
Engineering Psychology (MA, PhD)
Year human factors/ergonomics
program was established:
Contact person for more information, including applications:
Dominic Simon
NMSU, Department of Psychology
Las Cruces, NM 88003
505/646-1408
domsimon@nmsu.edu
Human factors/ergonomics graduate degrees offered:
Goals, objectives, and emphasis of the programs:
Emphases are (1) the application of models, theories, and principles pf perception, cognition, social psychology, and other areas of psychology; (2) training in quantitative and research methods; and (3) hands-on training in usability design and evaluation, with a focus on HCI and automation. Courses include a mix of basic and applied experimental psychology with a strong statistical component. All faculty have interests in measuring mental models and user knowledge. Other specific faculty research interests include information visualization, team cognition, information retrieval, instructional technology, and assistive technologies. In addition to classroom- and lab-based training, most students participate in internships to enhance their graduate training.
Number of degrees granted during last 3 years:
Can students attend part-time?
Does the university have an HFES student chapter?
APPLICATION PROCESS
ADMISSION REQUIREMENTS
Minimum requirements
- GPA 3.0
- GRE: 1000 v + q
- Other: Research methods and statistics
Importance of other criteria as admission factors:
- Research: medium
- Work experience: medium
- Letters: medium
- Interview: low
Tuition and fees
Resident: 1–11 credits $164/credit; 12–15 credits $1,968/semester
Nonresident: 1–6 credits $164/credit; 7–11 credits $522.25/credit; 12–15 credits $6,267/semester
ADMISSIONS
Number of students applying to the human factors/ergonomics program last year:
Number of students accepted into the program last year:
Number of students entering the program last year:
Anticipated number of openings per year for the next two years:
FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE
Percentage of students in program receiving financial assistance:
Amount received per year (minimum – typical – maximum):
$14,800 – $15,000 – $15,200
Types of assistance available:
Fellowship, TA, RA, scholarship, all tuition exempt
When should students apply for financial assistance?
With application, or by February 15 for fall semester
DEGREE REQUIREMENTS
Number of units required:
Exams required:
MA: thesis defense
PhD: qualifying exam for admission into PhD, comprehensive exam for admission to candidacy, dissertation defense
Practical experience required:
Typical number of years required to obtain degree:
Is there a non-thesis option?
CURRICULUM
Required Courses (units):
Quantitative Methods: Basic Statistics (3), Quantitative Methods: Experimental Design/ANOVA (3), Quantitative Methods: Regression (3); Engineering Psychology (3), plus selection from the following (6 units for MA, 9 for PhD, plus 6 additional units of statistics for PhD): Cognitive (3), Perception (3), Learning (3), Biopsychology (3), Developmental (3), Social (3)
Number of courses outside department that are required:
Number of courses outside department that are recommended:
Depends on student's program of study as determined with the committe
Average or typical class size in a required course:
RESEARCH/TEACHING OPPORTUNITIES
Research and support facilities available to students in the program:
Students do research with a faculty adviser and have access to that faculty member's lab facilities (total available lab space is approximately 11,000 square feet). Lab resources include 60 microcomputers, visual research equipment (e.g., tachistoscopes and eye movement recorders), aviation simulation equipment, and EEG and ERP recording systems. We have a state-of-the-art lab for studying team performance and cognition as team members perform various synthetic tasks, a lab for studying face-to-face interactions in simulated environments, a robotics control lab, and two computer-based labs for (a) developing multimedia applications (including Web-based applications) to be used as class projects or for teaching, (b) performing statistical analyses, (c) conducting usability tests and analyzing video data from the tests, and (d) developing experiments. In addition, the Psychology Department works in collaboration with other departments and labs on campus, including the Computer Science Department and the Computing Research Lab, resulting in research, development, and evaluation opportunities in human-computer interaction.
Teaching opportunities available to students in the program:
TAs lead recitation sections in Introductory Psychology and teach lab sections in Methods and Perception courses. PhD students are required to teach at least one course, but the more skilled teachers will have opportunities to teach several courses over their graduate careers. Advanced graduate students can teach in the weekend college, at the Dona Ana Branch Community College, or at branch campuses of NMSU.
Current research activities and projects being carried out by program faculty and/or students:
Research spans the breadth of applied cognitive psychology, with strong applications to the design and evaluation of various user interfaces. Specific research projects include analyzing how trust affects operator responses to automation recommendations, how operators monitor and control mulitple UAVs, visual search during luggage screening tasks, perceptual and cognitive processes in reading, the role of monitoring in prospective memory, cultural and individual differences in cognition, the Stroop effect, acquisition of knowledge and skills, and the relation between learners' metacognitive appraisals of their knowledge and their actual abilities.
STUDENT STATISTICS
Current number of active students in program, by gender:
Current number of first-year students in program:
Based on current graduate students in the program, the mean score on admission tests and undergraduate GPA by degree being sought are:
- MA: GRE 531 v, 668 q. GPA 3.41
- PhD: GRE 643 v, 683 q. GPA 3.72
FACULTY
Stephen Dixon, PhD 2006, U. Illinois; automation, trust, UAVs, attention, visual search
Peter Foltz, PhD 1993, U. Colorado; latent semantic analysis, information retrieval, discourse processing (on leave 2006–2007 academic year)
Melissa Guynn, PhD 2001, U. New Mexico; prospective memory, retrieval processes in human memory
Adrienne Lee, PhD 1993, U. Colorado; instructional technologies, learning and transfer, expertise (on leave 2006–2007 academic year)
Dominic Simon, PhD 1997, UCLA; acquisition of knowledge and skills, metacognition