From the Editor

Less than three weeks ago, I spent eight days in Ecuador and the Galapagos Islands. These are two of my favorite places in the world to explore. During our time in Ecuador, we toured the capital, Quito. One of the most majestic sites was the volcano, Mount Cotopaxi. Cotopaxi is located in the Andes Mountains about 43.5 miles (50 km) south of Quito. I have so many beautiful photos of the snow-capped volcano; in fact my profile photograph on Facebook is withCotopaxi!

As I write this From the Editor, Cotopaxi has had two minor explosions which was the catalyst for Ecuador President Correa to declare a state of emergency. With this declaration, a precautionary evacuation of small towns in the central part of the country has begun. The key to surviving a natural disaster, such as the eruption of Cotopaxi, is planning. I found the following resource on the website of the US Embassy in Ecuador particularly informative: Family Natural Disaster Preparedness and Survival Guide (http://photos.state.gov/libraries/quito/153436/ACS/10-04FNDPS.pdf) As I prepare for future travel, I intend to plan ahead by being more knowledgeable of how to prepare for natural disasters. I hope you will, too.

Now, onto this issue of WORK. It has two sections. The first is a special section on computer ergonomics guest-edited by Dr. Tom Albin. I know you will find these articles educational and instructive. I thank Tom for his leadership.

The second section contains 11 regular articles on a variety of topics. These include: the impact of gender in the participation in non-farm activities on household income and poverty levels in Pakistan; workplace risk factors contributing to absences in the workplace; a new technique for occupational fitness standards, an Italian multicenter study on the role and working conditions of movement science student employed in sports and recreational facilities; a case study on the task of repairing computers in a manufacturing company; the effects of dialogue groups on physicians’ work environment; psychosocial factors of US army soldiers related to returning to work; the optimal design method to minimize user’s thinking mapping load in human-machine interactions; the impact of physical activity in a population of teachers; the impact of the quality of encounters in returning to work; and vocational exploration in an extracurricular technology program for youth with autism.

As always, I welcome hearing from you and hope that you will consider submitting your scholarly work to our journal.

Cheers,