The effect of age on the hand movement time during machine paced assembly tasks for female workers

The share of older adults in the workforce is increasing in many countries. In the manufacturing industry a high proportion of assembly tasks are machine paced. Previous studies have shown that older adults tend to have longer movement times than younger adults when working at a self-selected pace. However, it is unclear whether older adults can obtain the same hand movement time as a younger group when performing machine paced work at the assembly line. In the current study, 10 older and 10 younger female participants performed simulated light-duty assembly tasks during which the hand movement times were recorded. The results showed that the older participants were capable of working at the set pace and there was no significant difference between age groups in hand movement times (989.9 msec vs. 986.6 msec, p = 0.5647). A likely explanation to the results is that the older participant had to work closer to their physical limits or capacity in order to compensate for the age effect on movement time. Relevance to industry: This study provided some preliminary quantitative data describing the hand movement time for younger and older female adults during machine paced assembly work. The results showed that age did not have a significant effect on hand movement time. Such results may help in adapting workplaces and work tasks to accommodate the needs of an aging workforce. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.