Research Area 02 · Construction Decision Intelligence Lab

Ergonomic and Physiological Exposure at Height and in Heat

Standard ergonomic and heat-stress scores ignore the context that makes construction work dangerous: height, harnesses, weather, and duration. This area builds exposure models that put that context back in, measured on working crews.

All research areas · Research frameworks

The problem

Standard ergonomic and heat-stress scores ignore the context that makes construction dangerous: the height, the harness, the direct sun, the tenth hour, the crew that came back from a week off. Slow injuries accumulate like fatigue damage and surface weeks after the work that built them, when the cause is gone from the workfront and the claim can no longer be traced.

The approach

Exposure models that put the context back in and are measured on working crews: ECERI and C-ERA extend REBA for height-exposed tasks; the planning-pressure index screens hot-weather work packages before release; wearable-sensor field studies measure physiological response to structured heat interventions. Each model states its simplification out loud and ends in a screen a planner can run.

Figure

What the Figure Shows

How ergonomic risk amplifies with working height for the same posture: the elevation term that standard scoring leaves out.
How ergonomic risk amplifies with working height for the same posture: the elevation term that standard scoring leaves out.

Research → Think Tank → Field Instruments

Papers, Notes, and Instruments

Papers evidence

  • The Elevated Construction Ergonomic Risk Index (ECERI): Contextualizing REBA for Height-Exposed TasksIN PRESS
  • Contextual Ergonomic Risk Amplification (C-ERA) Framework: A Novel Approach for Height-Exposed Construction Tasks2026
  • Pose Estimation for Ergonomic Risk Assessment in Steel Connection Tasks2026
  • Worker Perception and Physiological Responses to Heat Stress Prevention and Control Interventions in Construction2025
  • Enhancing Real-Time Decision Making for Heat Stress Prevention in Construction using Wearable Sensing DevicesIN PRESS
  • Physiological Effects of Structured Heat Stress Prevention Interventions in Construction Workers Using Wearable TechnologyUNDER REVIEW

Think Tank notes explanation

Field Instruments use

Named frameworks

Active work

Projects in This Area

UNDER REVIEW

Heat Stress Prevention with Wearable Sensing

Journal manuscript, with UTSA

Physiological response to structured heat-stress interventions, measured on working crews with wearable sensors, with the Safety Innovation and Sustainable Infrastructure Group at UTSA.

What it needs

  • Summer field partners in the Southeast and Southwest

Still open

Open Problems

  1. Validating ECERI and C-ERA against injury and claims records rather than expert ratings alone.
  2. Thermal debt across consecutive hot days, and what a shift-to-shift recovery model should look like.
  3. Wearable sensing at crew scale without turning the site into a surveillance problem.

Research in motion

Recent in This Area

Get in touch

Work With the Lab on This Area

Ergonomists and occupational health researchers; contractors running summer work or height-exposed trades who can host a wearable trial.

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