Hierarchical task analysis (HTA) is an approach designers use to organize user tasks into goals, subgoals, and steps, forming a clear task hierarchy. UX (user experience) designers use HTA to map user behavior, uncover bottlenecks, and streamline flows and so make interfaces intuitive and efficient from the ground up.
Explore how task analysis can help make great digital solutions in this video with Frank Spillers, CEO at Experience Dynamics.
Hierarchical task analysis (HTA) breaks complex user activities into structured layers—namely, goals, subgoals, operations, and plans. It gives UX teams visibility into how users work step by step, and the clarity and perspective HTA can give empowers designers to identify precisely where friction or confusion occurs and remedy it in the next design iteration.
To understand how HTA can help designers help their target audience, imagine users who are trying to book flights on an airline website but keep abandoning their purchase at checkout—leading to lost revenue for the company and (possibly) a sour impression for the users of that company.
Here, a user researcher or designer could use HTA to break down the “Book a Flight” task into a basic yet detailed structure such as this:
Main Goal: Successfully purchase airline ticket
1. Search for Flights
1.1 Enter departure/destination cities.
1.2 Select dates.
1.3 Choose passenger count.
1.4 Apply filters (price, time, stops).
2. Select Flight Options
2.1 Compare outbound flights.
2.2 Compare return flights.
2.3 Review total itinerary.
3. Enter Passenger Details
3.1 Input names exactly as shown on ID.
3.2 Add contact information.
3.3 Select seats.
4. Complete Payment
4.1 Enter payment method.
4.2 Apply discounts/miles.
4.3 Review final charges.
4.4 Confirm purchase if content.
Our designer might notice that HTA reveals the abandonment happens at steps 4.2–4.3; it’s because users get confused by unexpected fees appearing or can’t figure out how to apply their frequent flyer miles. Some of them may even suspect the brand is trying to cheat them, so the designer needs to act fast. This HTA uncovers how, instead of redesigning the entire booking flow, they can focus on making pricing transparent earlier and simplifying the rewards redemption process at checkout.
HTA can “save the day” for this brand and improve how users feel and engage with it. It’s a handy form of analysis and has roots in safety and efficiency. It originated in human-factors engineering to optimize performance in complex environments such as (fittingly, for our example) aviation and manufacturing. Designers adapted it for digital interfaces in the early 2000s to ensure that threaded task flows match users’ actual steps in the real world.
Hierarchical task analyses are particularly useful for design teams as they can help to:
HTA helps designers break down user tasks into subtasks and goals, creating a structured, step-by-step view of how people actually complete a process. This technique reveals the underlying architecture of a task—not just what users do, but how and why they do it in a particular sequence.
When they use HTA to map out the layers, dependencies, and decision points within a task, designers can spot patterns like:
Where users take detours because the system doesn’t align with their natural workflow.
Where users repeat steps needlessly, signaling inefficiency or confusion.
Where subtasks depend on information or conditions that aren’t always available or existent.
This level of analysis helps uncover hidden complexity in tasks that may seem simple on the surface. It provides a clear foundation for simplifying workflows, too, and so designers can reduce cognitive load and design interfaces that really do support real-world behavior—not just idealized steps.
When teams use HTA to break tasks down step by step, they can clearly identify problems like unnecessary actions or areas where users tend to make errors. This helps highlight opportunities for automation, simplification, or improved UI feedback, reducing friction and streamlining the user experience. It also exposes moments where users may feel confused, frustrated, or delayed—critical insights for prioritizing design improvements.
Pain points can, true to their name, not only wreck what should be seamless user experiences but also hurt the brand’s image, especially for users who are having trouble in more profound or compounded ways. Think back to our plane ticket customers; what if some of them had to book plane tickets and were already distressed—perhaps worried about sick family members they had to suddenly fly to reach in time? This is why a streamlined, easy-to-use system needs to prove the brand has empathy for travelers in their many contexts.
Explore how empathy in design can translate to happier users and better products—even if those products happen to be buildings—in our video.
Because people are different, they have unique idiosyncrasies and ways of understanding things and approaching concepts and tasks. Different users may complete the same task using different methods, depending on their experience level, mental model, or specific context—again, it’s a human world with much going on in users’ lives.
An HTA empowers designers to systematically map and compare these varying workflows, which can then reveal alternative strategies, shortcut behaviors, workarounds, and non-linear paths that users naturally take. This comparative view helps teams identify which variations are more efficient, which introduce risk or confusion, and where the design can better support flexibility, reduce complexity, or offer clearer guidance—especially for newer or less confident users.
For example, to return to the flight-booking website, consider User A and User B.
User A (Novice User)
Visits the homepage
Clicks “Flights”
Enters origin and destination
Selects travel dates from calendar
Clicks “Search”
Scrolls through results and compares times
Clicks flight details to compare amenities
Selects a flight and proceeds to checkout
User B (Experienced Traveler)
Uses the site’s quick-search bar on the homepage
Enters airport codes directly (e.g., JFK → LAX)
Selects flexible dates
Sorts by price immediately
Selects a preferred airline from filters
Books a flight in under 2 minutes
HTA diagrams act as clear, structured deliverables that visually break down user tasks into subtasks, flows, and dependencies. Since they’re straightforward and intuitive, developers, product managers, and other stakeholders can quickly grasp the user’s process without needing extensive explanation—it’s all right there in an easy-to-follow format, like an intuitive design in itself. This shared understanding improves communication, speeds up decision-making, and ensures everyone aligns on what users need and how the system should support them.
To build a HTA well, designers must understand its components:
Goal: The overall user objective (e.g., “Submit expense report”).
Subgoals: Intermediate objectives in accomplishing the main goal.
Operations: Atomic actions users perform, exploded into small granularity (e.g., “Click Submit”).
Plans: Rules that articulate how subgoals and operations relate—whether they run in sequence or parallel, or depend on conditions to be satisfied.
Each level has a hierarchical number, with level 0 = goal, 1 = subgoal, and so on.
Hierarchical task analyses are versatile in how they can help teams at several stages of their design process. It’s also important to know the difference between hierarchical task analysis and cognitive task analysis (CTA) in UX design—HTA excels at structural clarity, while CTA trawls deeper to yield further mental insight. While their purposes are similar—to optimize designs and make them easier for users to understand and flow through tasks in seamless experiences—HTAs are ideal to visualize task complexity, while CTAs offer an added helping hand to understand users’ thought processes in depth. You can use HTA:
Use HTA to explore task complexity before creating wireframes or prototypes. For example, HTAs can shed much light for teams who want to uncover workflow structure during the empathize/define phases of the design thinking process.
Discover fresh ground on which to build great digital solutions with design thinking, in this video.
Hasso-Platner Institute Panorama
Ludwig Wilhelm Wall, CC BY-SA 3.0
HTA isn’t just for designing new systems—it’s equally powerful for evaluating existing ones. Because an HTA breaks down current user workflows, it helps designers pinpoint inefficiencies, friction points, or redundant steps already embedded in the product. Team members can see where users take unexpected detours, loop back unnecessarily, or run into decision fatigue or even analysis paralysis. These insights reveal opportunities for streamlining, automation, or improving UI clarity—all without guessing where the problems are.
Systems with safety or compliance needs benefit from the granular clarity HTA provides in detecting error-prone steps. In keeping with its roots in human-factors engineering, this form of hierarchical analysis helps leave no stone unturned in a more high-stakes or intricate process, clearly exposing every point where indecision, unclear feedback, or other problems might get in the way.
The structured outputs from hierarchical analysis of tasks don’t just aid design—they also serve as excellent training tools. The clear breakdown of tasks and subtasks makes it easy to create onboarding guides, help documentation, or internal training materials for end users, support staff, and new team members. HTA diagrams show not just what to do, but how and why, too, which makes processes far easier to teach, learn, and retain in the mind of the trainee.
What goes into a great trip? Users already have a fair idea—a hierarchical task analysis can break this down into many micro-tasks so designers can address each smaller objective and make it a smooth ride every step of the way, or air mile of the journey.
© Interaction Design Foundation, CC BY-SA 4.0
To start, choose a clear, user-centered goal—something specific the user wants to accomplish, like “Book a flight,” “Submit a leave request,” or “Create a new document.” This goal becomes the top-level task in your analysis. Then, determine how deeply you'll break down the task, based on your research or design objectives. Are you identifying usability issues, streamlining a process, or designing from scratch? The level of detail should match your purpose—broader for strategic insights, deeper for implementation or redesign.
Speaking of detail, user research is crucial to understand the target users of a proposed solution, so you can understand why they need to do what they need or want to, among a variety of other factors. Fortunately, designers have a powerful ally they can leverage to help set strong foundations to build and iterate prototypes and design solutions—personas, fictitious representations of real users.
Discover how personas drive successful design and how designing without them falls short, in this video with William Hudson: User Experience Strategist and Founder of Syntagm Ltd.
Watch real users perform the task in context, or ask them to walk you through how they typically do it—step by step. Use techniques like contextual inquiry, think-aloud protocols, or screen recordings to capture both actions and reasoning. Pay attention not just to what users do, but also why they do it that way, as this helps surface actual behaviors, workarounds, and decision points that tend to go unnoticed in assumptions or documentation. You want to collect authentic, detailed task data that will inform your HTA with real-world accuracy and relevance to real people. That’s why you need a careful approach to engaging users in interview-like settings for methods such as contextual inquiries.
Explore the benefits and drawbacks of user interviews in this video with Ann Blandford: Professor of Human-Computer Interaction at University College London.
Start with level 0 (main goal) and then identify subgoals, operations, and define the plans that connect them. For example, you could break the “book a flight” task down into an ultra-fine level of granularity like this:
0. Book a flight
1. Search for Flights
Plan: Do 1.1–1.4 in any order, then proceed to 1.5.
1.1 Select type of trip (one-way, round-trip, multi-city).
1.2 Enter origin and destination airports.
1.3 Enter departure and return dates.
1.4 Specify number of passengers and travel class.
1.5 Submit search query.
2. Browse and Choose a Flight
Plan: Do 2.1–2.4 in order.
2.1 View search results.
2.2 Sort and filter results (e.g., by price, duration, airline, stops).
2.3 Compare flight options and schedules.
2.4 Select preferred outbound and return flights.
3. Review Flight Details
Plan: Do 3.1–3.3 in order.
3.1 Verify flight times, layovers, and total duration.
3.2 Confirm baggage allowance, seating, and in-flight services.
3.3 Continue to booking or go back to change selection.
4. Enter Passenger Information
Plan: Do 4.1–4.4 for each passenger.
4.1 Enter full name (as it appears on ID).
4.2 Add contact details (email and phone number).
4.3 Input travel document information (passport, visa, etc., if needed).
4.4 Add loyalty program or frequent flyer numbers (optional).
5. Select Optional Services
Plan: Complete any optional selections; then proceed.
5.1 Choose seat(s).
5.2 Add baggage (if not included).
5.3 Select travel insurance (optional).
5.4 Review or decline upgrade offers.
6. Provide Payment Information
Plan: Do 6.1–6.4 in order.
6.1 Enter payment method (credit card, PayPal, etc.).
6.2 Provide billing details.
6.3 Review total price and fare rules.
6.4 Submit payment.
7. Confirm Booking and Receive Documentation
Plan: Do 7.1–7.3 in order.
7.1 Display booking confirmation on screen.
7.2 Send confirmation email with ticket and itinerary.
7.3 Offer to save or print confirmation.
Go beyond linear task flows—add conditional, optional, or parallel paths, as these reflect how real users interact with systems in varied contexts. For example: “If the user requires seat selection, display the seat map in parallel.” Consider exceptions, errors, or alternate user strategies, too.
When you capture these branching paths, it helps you anticipate edge cases, support user flexibility, and design more resilient, intuitive interfaces. Mapping alternatives exposes where users may skip steps, backtrack, or need additional guidance, too—critical insights for refining navigation and flow. Again, think about what their context is like: stressful? On a mobile and out and about? What might they need to help guard-rail them or conform with their way of thinking or mental model about a task like booking tickets?
Climb to a higher altitude so you can create designs that speak to users in their unique contexts, in this video with Alan Dix: Author of the bestselling book “Human-Computer Interaction” and Director of the Computational Foundry at Swansea University.
Share your HTA with actual users, subject matter experts, or internal stakeholders (such as developers, product managers, or support staff). Walk through the steps together to make sure the task flow accurately reflects real-world behavior, not assumptions.
Validation is vital as it helps uncover missed steps, incorrect logic, or alternative paths you may have overlooked. It’s a great assumption-buster, too, as assumptions have a nasty habit of worming their way into design processes virtually undetected. Validation builds cross-functional alignment, too, as it ensures everyone shares a clear, accurate understanding of how users approach the task. That’s essential—everyone must be “on the same page” before you take ideas for creation or refinement further into design or development stages.
Now it’s time to “pour some concrete” and turn your HTA findings into actionable design decisions. Use the task structure to streamline user flows, eliminate unnecessary steps, and clarify UI (user interface) elements based on user goals and decision points. For example, was an icon or button in a part of the screen where users don’t typically expect to find it (such as a “Buy Now” button buried under the fold down at the bottom left of the screen)? Would better labelling make a button more noticeable? Or how about using a design pattern that’s more in step with your industry—such as UI design patterns that match what users would normally find on airline websites, with features such as date pickers?
In any case, pinpoint where guidance, feedback, or automation can support smoother interactions. Document edge cases—such as failed payments, missing info—as branches or subgoals to ensure they’re properly handled in the interface. Do form fields have prompts? Are they forgiving and automatically perform tasks like putting the spaces between the digits in phone and credit card numbers? When you ground your design in real cognitive workflows which real people understand and use, you can create experiences that aren’t only efficient but also intuitive, resilient, and user-centered.
Understand how the right choice of UI design patterns help make digital solutions more effective, trustworthy, and more, in our video.
The adage of “proof of the pudding is in the tasting” means it’s time to test what you’ve done. So, after applying your HTA insights to the design, evaluate the impact through usability testing. Find real users to test with. Measure key outcomes such as task completion time, error rates, and user satisfaction levels to see whether the design improvements truly enhance the experience.
Look for signs that the flow is smoother, clearer, and more intuitive. If users still struggle—be it due to unclear steps, missing guidance, unexpected detours, or a combination of factors—revisit your HTA to refine the task breakdown. Maybe a subgoal was “hiding” in the previous HTA? Can you split a task into finer granularity to spot what might be happening and where exactly? Iteration at this stage helps you ensure your final design has its foundations well rooted in real user behavior and is on course to improve to the best version possible to give users.
Here are some important points to bear in mind when conducting an HTA—beware of these common pitfalls in particular:
Too much granularity: Don’t break tasks into micro-steps that clutter and don’t contain any scope for problems themselves—stop when you gain clear insight.
Skipping validation: Always check your HTA with real users or subject experts; assumptions can creep in “unannounced.”
Ignoring edge cases: Document error conditions and optional flows, not just the ideal path—it’s vital to feel out the edges of the users’ ways of approaching and performing tasks.
Not linking to UX goals: Tie operations back to metrics like speed, error rate, or satisfaction—figures ground improvements in facts.
Overall, hierarchical task analysis offers clarity and convenience in design situations where users face complex workflows while handling tasks in their contexts—breaking goals into digestible, traceable steps. HTA may require upfront work, but it pays great dividends in task efficiency, user satisfaction, and well-structured products that support user needs.
When you need to understand how tasks unfold—whether it’s during early discovery or feature refinement—HTA can deliver reliable insights, informing design decisions, improving communication, and ensuring your product aligns with the actual way users think and act. When designers need to play the role of detective, HTA is a remarkably helpful tool to deduce what went wrong, how badly it went wrong, and—perhaps most importantly—why. If they’ve done their user research well, they’ll already know who uses their products and where they tend to use them. The additional information about the “what,” “how,” and “why” which an HTA can provide can help design teams fit together the last pieces of the puzzle. And, with those in place, their product’s users should never have to feel puzzled when they use it.
Want to know more about personas and how to use them effectively? Personas and User Research: Design Products and Services People Need and Want will show you how to gather meaningful user insights, avoid bias, and build research-backed personas that help you design intuitive, relevant products. You’ll walk away with practical skills and a certificate that demonstrates your expertise in user research and persona creation.
Explore how to stay steps ahead of users by understanding how they think—enjoy our Master Class How to Design with the Mind in Mind with Jeff Johnson, Assistant Professor, Computer Science Department, University of San Francisco.
Discover helpful tips, insights, and a helpful Task Analysis template in our article How to Improve Your UX Designs with Task Analysis.
Get a greater grasp of what matters to users when it comes to tasks and more in Smashing Magazine’s article Top Tasks: To Focus On What Matters You Must De-Focus On What Doesn’t.
Explore further areas in the UX24/7 article Hierarchical Task Analysis: Understanding How Users Achieve Their Goals.
UX (user experience) designers use hierarchical task analysis (HTA) to break down complex user tasks into smaller, manageable steps so they can better understand how users achieve their goals, revealing pain points and opportunities for improvement.
HTA supports designers as they focus on making more intuitive and successful design solutions by mapping the user flow through a system. Designers identify sub-tasks and decision points, which leads to better-informed design choices that result in better usability and more. For instance, if users tend to abandon a checkout process, HTA might reveal friction in a sub-task like entering shipping details or payment details (such as a credit card number field rejecting numbers because some users “fail” to put a space after every fourth digit as custom “demands”).
Get a greater grasp of usability and know how it works as a vital ingredient in UX design.
A hierarchical task analysis (HTA) consists of four essential elements:
User goal (primary task): Define the overarching objective users aim to achieve—e.g., “Complete checkout.”
Subgoals or sub-tasks: Break that goal into smaller, sequential tasks. Designers number them (1.1, 1.2, etc.) to clarify structure and dependencies.
Operations: Decompose subtasks into specific actions—like "enter email address." These represent the most granular, observable steps.
Plans (control logic): Describe the sequence and conditions—e.g., “if guest, skip login; else, prompt for credentials”—guiding how operations unfold.
Together, these elements form a structured, logical hierarchy and help UX designers visualize user workflows, uncover friction points, and prioritize refinements that improve clarity, efficiency, and usability. Designers can then inform their solutions to match what users need in the moment and so users do not get confused or overwhelmed.
Explore how users mentally “register” design solutions to get a better understanding of how to accommodate them, in our article Information Overload, Why it Matters and How to Combat It.
UX designers apply hierarchical task analysis (HTA) to tasks that involve multiple steps, decision points, or clear goals, and HTA works best for:
Complex or multistep workflows—like onboarding, checkout processes, or configuring software—where designers break down each phase for clarity.
Procedural tasks with clear start and end points, such as booking medical appointments or filing taxes.
Error-prone or safety-critical activities, where identifying each step helps spot potential failure points, some of which can involve high-stakes consequences.
Enterprise or professional tools—like healthcare systems or enterprise software—where workflows are often nested, conditional, or require precise actions from trained users, who still need intuitive designs to help them do their jobs efficiently, effectively, and safely.
HTA suits tasks with clear hierarchies and dependencies, but it struggles with highly creative or ambiguous tasks lacking predictable structure. So, use HTA when you need a clear, visual breakdown of what users must do and when logic flows matter.
Discover how to discover what you need to know about your users and the complexity of their problems, situations, and potential solutions—user research helps uncover vital insights.
It depends; HTA usually goes two to five levels deep—whatever it takes to break down tasks into clear, observable actions without drowning in detail. Strike the right balance: stop when subtasks become simple, atomic operations (that you cannot break into smaller parts), or when further decomposition adds little insight; you should have enough.
Use your goals to guide depth: if you aim to enhance UI (user interface) elements, drill down to clicks or field entries. However, for training manuals, deeper levels help clarify procedures.
A good rule is to stop when each step maps directly to a user action or decision and adds practical value. When elements become repetitive, trivial, or have low impact, you have likely gone deep enough to bring problems to the surface, get behind mindsets of users, and expose and challenge (or validate) assumptions.
Find many helpful tips and insights about hierarchies in our article How to Show Hierarchical Data with Information Visualization.
UX designers group tasks in HTA according to similarity, sequence, and function to create logical, meaningful clusters.
First, identify tasks that share a common goal or outcome—group them under a single sub-goal to keep structure intuitive. Next, sequence related tasks that naturally belong together, like “select date,” “choose time,” and “add to cart” under “schedule appointment.” Designers can group tasks by conditional flows, too—for example, “guest checkout” versus “logged-in checkout”—to highlight decision points.
Use similarity criteria: tasks that use the same input method, interface area, or tools often fit into one group. Review groups by asking: “Does this chunk reflect a coherent user activity?” Re-group if you need to. This method ensures each group represents a meaningful step in the user journey, streamlines analysis, and helps spot clusters of friction or inefficiency.
Discover how to discover important insights about what users experience and apply them to more effective designs through customer journey maps.
Designers ensure a task hierarchy makes sense by validating it with real users and refining based on their feedback. First, test the HTA in usability test sessions—ask users to perform tasks while they are thinking aloud. This reveals mismatches between your model and actual user behavior, and it can help explode assumptions you may have made about users that are not accurate.
Next, walk the hierarchy through users or stakeholders: ask them if grouped steps reflect their mental model and goals—such as the clusters of sequences they would take to book airline tickets. Adjust any nodes that confuse users or do not align with their intentions. Compare your HTA against performance data, too—the truth is in the figures as well as what users say; so, drop subtasks that rarely occur and elevate ones that impact completion time or errors. Lastly, iterate: update and re-test until users can navigate the hierarchy naturally; when they can, congratulations on accommodating their real behaviors, supporting clarity, and boosting the usability of your digital solution.
Explore the treacherous terrain of assumptions and what they can do in design—and how to manage them successfully.
Yes, UX (user experience) designers often combine HTA with personas and journey maps to create richer, user-centered insights. Here are some helpful points:
Use personas to select HTA targets, as personas represent distinct user needs, helping you pick which tasks to analyze in-depth—like a busy “Working Professional” needing quick workflows versus a “New User” needing guidance.
Align hierarchical structures with user journey stages. Use HTA to map detailed task breakdowns within broader journey phases—for example, specify substeps inside the “Checkout” stage of a persona journey.
Reveal persona-specific paths. Personas typically often follow different HTA branches—like guest vs. logged-in checkout flows—which makes it clearer where their journeys diverge.
Peer at the power of personas by enjoying our Master Class User Stories Don't Help Users: Introducing Persona Stories with William Hudson, Consultant Editor and Author.
You keep your Hierarchical Task Analysis (HTA) accurate and up to date by iterating it as user behavior or designs change. First, capture real user data—observe tasks, interview users, and collect analytics to spot new steps, shortcuts, or errors. Next, compare updates against your existing hierarchy: add emerging subtasks, remove obsolete ones, and revise plans as flows shift. Then, validate with users or stakeholders through walkthroughs and usability tests to ensure your model matches their mental processes.
Lastly, document and version your HTA, noting when and why each change occurred. By treating HTA as a “living document,” you align your design with real user needs and stay responsive as the product or its users evolve. The document itself is a design with a user base, too.
Dive deep into usability testing and come away with powerful insights on how to validate designs successfully.
Common HTA mistakes include these:
Lacking a clear scope: Design teams break down tasks without defining the goal or intended outcome, leading to scattered, irrelevant steps.
Picking the wrong analysis type: Using HTA for highly cognitive or emotional tasks misses important mental and decision-making nuances
Relying on a single data source; Ignoring real user behavior by using only assumptions, surveys, or one research method compromises accuracy.
Over‐decomposing tasks: You can go too deep, and it can make for trivial or repetitive operations that clog the model and offer little value.
Avoid these mistakes by defining a solid goal, combining HTA with cognitive or contextual methods where needed, using multiple research sources, and stopping the task or step breakdown when steps become basic user actions.
Consider cognitive task analysis as a suitable alternative when you need to dig deeper into user thought processes.
UX designers use HTA effectively in agile or lean UX workflows by integrating it as a lightweight, iterative analysis tool that complements fast-paced development. A good practice places HTA in discovery sprints (Cycle Zero) to map core user tasks before any design work begins.
Designers then build quick HTA sketches via whiteboards or Kanban cards to visualize task steps and dependencies—with just enough detail to guide user stories without slowing down the team.
During design sprints, update the HTA based on usability testing and analytics. As new details emerge—or you spot errors—adjust subtasks and plans. Then feed refined tasks back into backlog grooming to form acceptance criteria and drive iterative improvements
Note: Many agile teams keep HTA as a living document in shared tools. They update HTA at end of each sprint or when data shows shifting user behavior. This ensures design stays grounded in real workflows, reduces rework, and keeps UX aligned with product evolution.
Access Agile UX design to assess how this approach might work for your design team.
Stanton, N. A. (2006). Hierarchical task analysis: Developments, applications and extensions. Applied Ergonomics, 37(1), 55–79.
This landmark article by Stanton comprehensively synthesizes three decades of work on Hierarchical Task Analysis (HTA), establishing it as a foundational methodology in ergonomics and human factors. It offers a structured overview of HTA theoretical basis, including its principles of goal decomposition and sequencing, while highlighting applications in workload assessment, training design, interface development, and function allocation. Stanton also introduces important extensions like temporal task analysis and error prediction. Its clarity and breadth have made it a highly cited and essential reference for academics and practitioners working with complex systems and human–machine interaction.
Aarset, M. V. (2013). Hierarchical task analysis, situation-awareness and support software. In Proceedings of the 27th European Conference on Modelling and Simulation (ECMS) (pp. 503–509). European Council for Modelling and Simulation.
This paper by Aarset bridges classic HTA and modern situation-awareness challenges by embedding HTA-derived goal hierarchies into software systems used in offshore operations. It explores how HTA informs user interface design to match operator mental models, supporting decision-making in dynamic environments. This work stands out by demonstrating the role of HTA not only in offline task modeling but in real-time, operational support tools. This paper has been cited in multiple engineering and cognitive systems design studies, especially within safety-critical industries like maritime and oil platforms. The PDF is freely accessible via ResearchGate and presents a clear, applied model of HTA in digital systems.
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