Development of a quantitative Bayesian network mapping objective factors to subjective performance shaping factor evaluations: An example using student operators in a digital nuclear power plant simulator

Abstract Traditional human reliability analysis methods consist of two main steps: assigning values for performance shaping factors (PSFs), and assessing human error probability (HEP) based on PSF values. Both steps rely on expert judgment. Considerable advances have been made in reducing reliance on expert judgment for HEP assessment by incorporating human performance data from various sources (e.g., simulator experiments); however, little has been done to reduce reliance on expert judgment for PSF assignment. This paper introduces a data-driven approach for assessing PSFs in Nuclear Power Plants (NPPs) based on contextual information. The research illustrates how to develop a Bayesian PSF network using data collected from student operators in a NPP simulator. The approach starts with a baseline PSF model that calculates PSF values from context information during an accident scenario. Then, a Bayesian model is developed to link the baseline model to the Subjective PSFs. Two additional factors are included: simulator bias and context information. Results and analysis include variation between the results of the proposed model and the training dataset, and the significance of each element in the model. The proposed approach reduces the reliance of PSF assignment on expert judgment and is particularly suitable for dynamic human reliability analysis.