For this section, I will directly cite a Wikipedia page on human factors engineering as it is perfect to get the point across:

“In 1943 Alphonse Chapanis, a lieutenant in the U.S. Army, showed that this so-called ‘pilot error’ could be greatly reduced when more logical and differentiable controls replaced confusing designs in airplane cockpits. After the war, the Army Air Force published 19 volumes summarizing what had been established from research during the war.”

This article is part of the book "A Tiny History of Service Design, " a tiny two-hour read that goes through the historical events that created what Service Design is today.