Ifsttar PhD subject

French version
Detailed form :

Title : Measuring the situational acceptability of a professional technology - a longitudinal approach

Main host Laboratory - Referent Advisor   -

Director of the main host Laboratory   -

PhD Speciality Psychologie ergonomique - Psychologie du travail

Axis of the performance contract 1 - COP2017 - Efficient transport and safe travel

Main location Marne-la-Vallée

Doctoral affiliation CONSERVATOIRE NATIONAL DES ARTS ET METIERS-PARIS

PhD school Abbé-Grégoire

Planned PhD supervisor BOBILLIER CHAUMON Marc Eric  -  CNAM Paris  -  Centre de recherche sur le travail et le développement (CRTD) - EA 4132

Planned financing Thèse sur contrat  - Ifsttar

Abstract

Context and objectives:
Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) encompass a set of technologies and applications that enable efficient data exchange between transport system components and actors, between vehicles (V2V) or between infrastructure and vehicles (V2I). While the deployment of Phase 1 services has already begun, many issues remain to be explored, such as legal, organizational, governance, technical and standardization issues. As part of a European cooperation, InDiD (Digital Infrastructure of Tomorrow) is a pilot project for the deployment of C-ITS whose objective is to develop and test innovative Phase 2 solutions to: improve the experience of road users, protect vulnerable users, improve user and vehicle perception, pave the way for increased and autonomous mobility. The project is coordinated by the MTES. Activity 2 is devoted in particular to the technical, social, health, legal, environmental and economic evaluation of C-ITS systems. One of the anticipated impacts concerns the organization of road operations. The new services and tools necessarily imply a change in the organisation of road operators, which raises questions about work procedures, acceptability or management methods...
Scientific locks :
Many approaches seek to consider the factors at play in the acceptance of professional or personal technologies. These approaches consider different stages of the relationship to technology. Social acceptability has focused on the phases prior to the manipulation of technology by measuring the user's representations of use characteristics (attitudes, perceptions) and social integration (beliefs, norms). Practical acceptability focuses more on the actual use phase, particularly in the early stages of use. It studies the user experience through dimensions such as utility, ease of use, satisfaction or comfort of use and emotional comfort. A last phase is qualified by different names: adoption, appropriation, situated acceptance, symbiosis.... It covers the concrete experience of people with the technology and activity implemented. It is less concerned with the acceptance of technologies itself than with the acceptance of practices that are permitted, prevented, transformed or constrained by the use of the device.
Through a longitudinal approach, starting from the design stage through the testing and experimentation phases of the device, the doctoral student will seek to reconcile these different levels of acceptability analysis and test their relevance for the different stages of the relationship between an employee and a professional communication and activity management application. This question is all the more interesting because road operation is not traditionally an activity instrumented by technologies.
Course of the thesis:
Problematic issues
The aim is to identify the factors and conditions that can make these new technological working methods acceptable to road professionals who are used to working according to professional rules and practices, where the technological tool is rarely used or even totally excluded. Based on a detailed understanding of the activity, this research aims to involve professionals in the analysis of their own work and in the co-design of the resulting technological project; these artifacts necessarily affect the way people think, do and collaborate in the work. The objective is then to identify as precisely as possible (i) the functions that the system should propose to assist the professional in his practices and (ii) the place/role that this system should play in the activity in order to enable employees to exercise their profession according to the rules of the art (notions of quality and meaning of work), to be able to develop their activity and to renew their skills while maintaining their autonomy. In addition, these technological environments will also have to be designed to be not only appropriate to the specificities of users and the characteristics of their activity, but also sufficiently appropriate (adaptable) in the always unique circumstances of the activity. These are the necessary conditions for the adoption of these systems in professional situations. In other words, technology must not only have meaning for future users (meaning that they are useful, usable and well perceived), it must also give meaning to the activity being carried out. The same technology being implemented in different contexts (management modes, procedures, employee qualification, change management), over a long period of time. This thesis offers the possibility to compare the evolution and result of an implementation process according to parameters with the modalities to be identified. It may also be possible to conduct action research by intervening on the process at some voluntary pilot sites.
Work process, method
The first phase of the work will be to position the technical system developed with regard to the activity of road operation professionals and the organization in place. What personal, identity, organizational, interpersonal, collective impacts can be considered? What levers and constraints can it introduce? To this end, an in-depth study of the technical specifications is planned (documentary analysis) to be compared with the current activity implemented (instrumented observations, self-confrontation, individual and group interviews, critical impact methods, explanation interviews, etc.).
The second phase will be to gather the views of professionals (interviews and questionnaires) at different hierarchical levels and at different stages of technological deployment.
How do employees view technology, their interaction with it, its socio-organizational, professional and identity impact?
Innovative character
The thesis is based on an analytical approach that is anthropocentric (focused on understanding the activity and end users) to support the design of the system and create acceptable conditions and favourable resources for the adoption of this new environment. Another contribution of the thesis is based on the development of ad hoc research and intervention methodologies. These will have to take into account the specificities as well as the constraints of access to the different research fields investigated. They will strive to be the least intrusive while attempting to reflect as accurately as possible the activity that is taking place. Thus, self-confrontation or verbalization methods may be used. Similarly, it is expected to simulate the probable future activity that will take place with this new system in order to detect favourable or unfavourable developments in working practices, sources of acceptance of the system. Again, innovative methods, to stage and test the device in different versions, will be deployed to inform the design process in an iterative development process "for and by" use. A final contribution concerns the socio-organisational impacts/benefits (social dialogue, confrontation of practices, knowledge and recognition of skills and scope of action between teams), to which this project can lead. It can thus enable collectives of professionals as well as the different actors/partners of their activity, to reflect together on the improvement of their working conditions, the optimization of work procedures and resources. In a quality of life at work approach, this project of socio-technical innovation of work can be the pretext to rediscuss and rethink more globally the modalities of work practice that are not going to or no longer, and could be accentuated with the arrival of this new technical system.
Expected results and valorisation
The expected results relate to the identification of relevant factors to be taken into account in order to understand the acceptance of technologies in a professional context at different stages of implementation, from project to actual implementation. They also concern the identification of concrete actions to be implemented (technological or organisational) to facilitate the success of C-ITS projects with road operators for wider deployment in France and Europe.
Various scientific applications (communications and articles) and for the general public (professional and ministerial conferences) are envisaged.
Bibliographical references
Bobillier-Chaumon, M.-E. (2013). Conditions d’usage et facteurs d’acceptation des technologies de l'activité : Questions et perspectives pour la psychologie du travail. HDR en Psychologie. Ecole doctorale Sciences de l’Homme, du Politique, et du Territoire, https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-01559686
Brangier, E., Hammes-Adelé, S., & Bastien, J. M. (2010). Analyse critique des approches de l’acceptation des technologies: de l’utilisabilité à la symbiose humain-technologie-organisation. Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée/European Review of Applied Psychology, 60(2), 129-146.

Keywords : Situated acceptability, longitudinal study, C-ITS

Main host Laboratory - Referent Advisor	-
Director of the main host Laboratory	-
PhD Speciality	Psychologie ergonomique - Psychologie du travail
Axis of the performance contract	1 - COP2017 - Efficient transport and safe travel
Main location	Marne-la-Vallée
Doctoral affiliation	CONSERVATOIRE NATIONAL DES ARTS ET METIERS-PARIS
PhD school	Abbé-Grégoire
Planned PhD supervisor	BOBILLIER CHAUMON Marc Eric - CNAM Paris - Centre de recherche sur le travail et le développement (CRTD) - EA 4132
Planned financing	Thèse sur contrat - Ifsttar
Abstract Context and objectives: Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems (C-ITS) encompass a set of technologies and applications that enable efficient data exchange between transport system components and actors, between vehicles (V2V) or between infrastructure and vehicles (V2I). While the deployment of Phase 1 services has already begun, many issues remain to be explored, such as legal, organizational, governance, technical and standardization issues. As part of a European cooperation, InDiD (Digital Infrastructure of Tomorrow) is a pilot project for the deployment of C-ITS whose objective is to develop and test innovative Phase 2 solutions to: improve the experience of road users, protect vulnerable users, improve user and vehicle perception, pave the way for increased and autonomous mobility. The project is coordinated by the MTES. Activity 2 is devoted in particular to the technical, social, health, legal, environmental and economic evaluation of C-ITS systems. One of the anticipated impacts concerns the organization of road operations. The new services and tools necessarily imply a change in the organisation of road operators, which raises questions about work procedures, acceptability or management methods... Scientific locks : Many approaches seek to consider the factors at play in the acceptance of professional or personal technologies. These approaches consider different stages of the relationship to technology. Social acceptability has focused on the phases prior to the manipulation of technology by measuring the user's representations of use characteristics (attitudes, perceptions) and social integration (beliefs, norms). Practical acceptability focuses more on the actual use phase, particularly in the early stages of use. It studies the user experience through dimensions such as utility, ease of use, satisfaction or comfort of use and emotional comfort. A last phase is qualified by different names: adoption, appropriation, situated acceptance, symbiosis.... It covers the concrete experience of people with the technology and activity implemented. It is less concerned with the acceptance of technologies itself than with the acceptance of practices that are permitted, prevented, transformed or constrained by the use of the device. Through a longitudinal approach, starting from the design stage through the testing and experimentation phases of the device, the doctoral student will seek to reconcile these different levels of acceptability analysis and test their relevance for the different stages of the relationship between an employee and a professional communication and activity management application. This question is all the more interesting because road operation is not traditionally an activity instrumented by technologies. Course of the thesis: Problematic issues The aim is to identify the factors and conditions that can make these new technological working methods acceptable to road professionals who are used to working according to professional rules and practices, where the technological tool is rarely used or even totally excluded. Based on a detailed understanding of the activity, this research aims to involve professionals in the analysis of their own work and in the co-design of the resulting technological project; these artifacts necessarily affect the way people think, do and collaborate in the work. The objective is then to identify as precisely as possible (i) the functions that the system should propose to assist the professional in his practices and (ii) the place/role that this system should play in the activity in order to enable employees to exercise their profession according to the rules of the art (notions of quality and meaning of work), to be able to develop their activity and to renew their skills while maintaining their autonomy. In addition, these technological environments will also have to be designed to be not only appropriate to the specificities of users and the characteristics of their activity, but also sufficiently appropriate (adaptable) in the always unique circumstances of the activity. These are the necessary conditions for the adoption of these systems in professional situations. In other words, technology must not only have meaning for future users (meaning that they are useful, usable and well perceived), it must also give meaning to the activity being carried out. The same technology being implemented in different contexts (management modes, procedures, employee qualification, change management), over a long period of time. This thesis offers the possibility to compare the evolution and result of an implementation process according to parameters with the modalities to be identified. It may also be possible to conduct action research by intervening on the process at some voluntary pilot sites. Work process, method The first phase of the work will be to position the technical system developed with regard to the activity of road operation professionals and the organization in place. What personal, identity, organizational, interpersonal, collective impacts can be considered? What levers and constraints can it introduce? To this end, an in-depth study of the technical specifications is planned (documentary analysis) to be compared with the current activity implemented (instrumented observations, self-confrontation, individual and group interviews, critical impact methods, explanation interviews, etc.). The second phase will be to gather the views of professionals (interviews and questionnaires) at different hierarchical levels and at different stages of technological deployment. How do employees view technology, their interaction with it, its socio-organizational, professional and identity impact? Innovative character The thesis is based on an analytical approach that is anthropocentric (focused on understanding the activity and end users) to support the design of the system and create acceptable conditions and favourable resources for the adoption of this new environment. Another contribution of the thesis is based on the development of ad hoc research and intervention methodologies. These will have to take into account the specificities as well as the constraints of access to the different research fields investigated. They will strive to be the least intrusive while attempting to reflect as accurately as possible the activity that is taking place. Thus, self-confrontation or verbalization methods may be used. Similarly, it is expected to simulate the probable future activity that will take place with this new system in order to detect favourable or unfavourable developments in working practices, sources of acceptance of the system. Again, innovative methods, to stage and test the device in different versions, will be deployed to inform the design process in an iterative development process "for and by" use. A final contribution concerns the socio-organisational impacts/benefits (social dialogue, confrontation of practices, knowledge and recognition of skills and scope of action between teams), to which this project can lead. It can thus enable collectives of professionals as well as the different actors/partners of their activity, to reflect together on the improvement of their working conditions, the optimization of work procedures and resources. In a quality of life at work approach, this project of socio-technical innovation of work can be the pretext to rediscuss and rethink more globally the modalities of work practice that are not going to or no longer, and could be accentuated with the arrival of this new technical system. Expected results and valorisation The expected results relate to the identification of relevant factors to be taken into account in order to understand the acceptance of technologies in a professional context at different stages of implementation, from project to actual implementation. They also concern the identification of concrete actions to be implemented (technological or organisational) to facilitate the success of C-ITS projects with road operators for wider deployment in France and Europe. Various scientific applications (communications and articles) and for the general public (professional and ministerial conferences) are envisaged. Bibliographical references Bobillier-Chaumon, M.-E. (2013). Conditions d’usage et facteurs d’acceptation des technologies de l'activité : Questions et perspectives pour la psychologie du travail. HDR en Psychologie. Ecole doctorale Sciences de l’Homme, du Politique, et du Territoire, https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/tel-01559686 Brangier, E., Hammes-Adelé, S., & Bastien, J. M. (2010). Analyse critique des approches de l’acceptation des technologies: de l’utilisabilité à la symbiose humain-technologie-organisation. Revue européenne de psychologie appliquée/European Review of Applied Psychology, 60(2), 129-146.
Keywords :	Situated acceptability, longitudinal study, C-ITS

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