User-Centered Design (VIII): A New Framework of Intelligent Sociotechnical Systems and Prospects for Future Human Factors Research

Abstract: Traditional sociotechnical systems (STS) theory has been widely used, but there are many new characteristics in the STS environment as we enter the intelligence era, resulting in the limitations of traditional STS. Based on the "user-centered design" philosophy, this paper proposes a new framework of intelligent sociotechnical systems (iSTS) and outlines the new characteristics of iSTS as well as its implications for the development of intelligent systems. Future research of iSTS requires interdisciplinary collaboration, including human factors engineering, this paper finally proposes suggestions from two aspects of human factors engineering methodology and approaches.