Dr Stuart Bennett

Dr S Bennett, DipAM, PhD, CEng, FInstMC, MIMechE
Honorary Research Fellow,
Department of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering,
and Research Associate, Institute of Work Pyschology

Phone: +44 114 222 3251

Email: s.bennett @ sheffield.ac.uk

Current Research Interests

Measurement, control and the organisation of work in the 20th century.

Most sociological and historical studies of work organisation and the labour process have concentrated on mechanization and on simple forms of automation in which there are a fixed set of predetermined responses to measured changes in the environment or the system output. The use, in some industries, of feedback control systems capable of responding to wide variations in environmental conditions and of correcting processes during operation has largely been ignored. This research explores in depth the complex relationships between the nature and organisation of work, measurement and feedback control technologies, and the use of feedback and control theories in non-technological areas. For my previous work in this area see History of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering.

History of Automatic Control and Systems Engineering

Emotion Networks

Communications between people at work carry emotional overtones that can change the internal emotional state of the person receiving the communication. Computer simulations are being used to investigate how differing assumptions about the emotional behaviour of individuals affect the overall behaviour of the network. The underlying simulation models are based on patterns of mood dynamics reported in the literature. The work is being done in collaboration with colleagues in the Institute of Work Psychology.

Recent Publications

Clegg, C., Chu, C., Smithson, S., Henney, A., Willis, D., Jagodzinski, P., Hopkins, B., Icasati-Johanson, B., Fleck, S., Nicholls, J., Bennett, S., Land, F., Peltu, M., and Patterson, M. (2005). "A Sociotechnical Study of E-business: Grappling with an Octopus." Journal of Electronic Commerce in Organizations, 3(1), 53-71.
Latif-Shabgahi, G., Bass, J. M., and Bennett, S. (2004). "Multiple error filtering in cyclic systems." Computer Journal, 47(3), 299-308.
Latif-Shabgahi, G., Bass, J. M., and Bennett, S. (2004). "A Taxonomy for Software Voting Algorithms Used in Safety Critical Systems." IEEE Transactions on Reliability, 53(4), 319-328.
Cascaval, P., Bennett, S., and Hutanu, C. (2004). "Efficient March Tests for a Reduced 3-Coupling and 4-Coupling Faults in Random-Access Memories." Journal of Electronic Testing: Theory and Applications, 20(3), 227-243.
Bennett, S. (2004). "Technological Concepts and Mathematical Models in the Evolution of Control Engineering." In M. Lucertini, A. M. Gasca, and F. Nicolo, (eds), Technological Concepts and Mathematical Models in the Evolution of Modern Engineering Systems, Birkhauser, Basel, 103-122.
Riddalls, C. E., and Bennett, S. (2003). "Quantifying bounded rationality: Managerial behaviour and the Smith predictor." International Journal of Systems Science, 34(6), 413-426.
Latif-Shabgahi, G., Bennett, S., and Bass, J. M. (2003). "Smoothing voter: A novel voting algorithm for handling multiple errors in fault-tolerant control systems." Microprocessors and Microsystems, 27(7), 303-313.