Use of evidential reasoning for eliciting bayesian subjective probabilities in human reliability analysis: A maritime case

Abstract

Modelling the interdependencies among the factors influencing human error (e.g. the common performance conditions (CPCs) in Cognitive Reliability Error Analysis Method (CREAM)) stimulates the use of Bayesian Networks (BNs) in Human Reliability Analysis (HRA). However, subjective probability elicitation for a BN is often a daunting and complex task. To create conditional probability values for each given variable in a BN requires a high degree of knowledge and engineering effort, often from a group of domain experts. This paper presents a novel hybrid approach for incorporating the evidential reasoning (ER) approach with BNs to facilitate HRA under incomplete data. The kernel of this approach is to develop the best and the worst possible conditional subjective probabilities of the nodes representing the factors influencing HRA when using BNs in human error probability (HEP). The proposed hybrid approach is demonstrated by using CREAM to estimate HEP in the maritime area. The findings from the hybrid ER-BN model can effectively facilitate HEP analysis in specific and decision-making under uncertainty in general.