Richard Backs - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Richard Backs

Groups of young, middle-aged, and older adults performed a battery of computer-based attention ta... more Groups of young, middle-aged, and older adults performed a battery of computer-based attention tasks, the UFOV® and neuropsychological tests, and simulated low-speed driving in a suburban scenario. Results from the attention tasks were submitted to Maximum Likelihood factor analysis and 6 factors were extracted that explained more than 57% of the task variance. The factors were labeled speed, switching, visual search, executive, sustained, and divided attention in descending order of amount of task variance explained. The factor scores were used to predict simulated driving performance. Step-wise regressions were computed with driving performance as the criterion, and age, sex and the factor scores, the UFOV® scores, or the neuropsychological test scores as predictors. Results showed that the perceptual-motor speed and divided attention measures from the UFOV® and attention battery were more likely to explain driving performance variance than the neuropsychological tests.

The purpose of this project was to provide MDOT with insight regarding the effectiveness of poten... more The purpose of this project was to provide MDOT with insight regarding the effectiveness of potential implementations of behavioral countermeasures for increasing driver safety in Michigan. The Center for Driver Evaluation, Education, and Research at Central Michigan University performed a series of tasks including 1) a literature review of driver safety behavioral countermeasures that have been used in the State of Michigan, 2) a literature review of driver safety behavioral countermeasures that have been used nationally, and 3) a pilot study of a countermeasure that was deemed promising for implementation in construction zones. In this report, the findings of the literature reviews are provided as well as estimations of their potential effectiveness, costs, and implementation issues. The driver safety problem areas covered in this report are alcohol-impaired driving, young drivers, distracted driving, drowsy driving, and older drivers. A review of new and innovative solutions that...

Driving assessment 2005 : proceedings of the 3rd International Driving Symposium on Human Factors in Driver Assessment, Training, and Vehicle Design, 2005

An autonomic space model of sympathetic and parasympathetic influences on the heart has been prop... more An autonomic space model of sympathetic and parasympathetic influences on the heart has been proposed as a method of deciphering psychological-physiological mappings for driving-related tasks. In the current study, we explore the utility of the autonomic space model for deciphering mappings in a driving simulation environment by comparing a single-task driving-only condition to two dual-task, driving-with-a-secondary-workingmemory task conditions. Although limited by a small sample size, the results illustrate the advantages physiological measures can have over performance measures for detecting changes in the psychological process required for drivingrelated task performance. Future research will include a repetition of this same study with more subjects as well the collection of on-the-road autonomic nervous system data.

Human Factors and Ergonomics, 2008

How motivation affects cardiovascular response: Mechanisms and applications., 2012

Biological psychiatry, 1984

Longitudinal and cross-sectional event-related potential, EEG power spectral, and skin conductanc... more Longitudinal and cross-sectional event-related potential, EEG power spectral, and skin conductance level data were obtained from 138 hyperactive and 60 normal boys. A age-by-diagnosis interaction was found for several measures in the cross-sectional data and for all three types of measures in the longitudinal data. These findings emphasize the importance of age in electrophysiological studies of young children and strongly suggest an abnormal maturational process in hyperactive children.

Psychophysiology, 1988

ABSTRACT Auditory evoked potentials were recorded from 19 electrode sites in 20 children with Att... more ABSTRACT Auditory evoked potentials were recorded from 19 electrode sites in 20 children with Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity and 20 normal subjects in a two-choice discrimination task. N2 and Nd were found to be significantly smaller in subjects with Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity. The N2 abnormalities are discussed in relationship to the mismatch negativity component of the orienting response, poor discrimination of salient stimuli, neurotransmitter deficiency, and theories of “arousal.’Nd findings are related to findings from studies of cerebral blood flow in children diagnosed as having Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity. These results suggest a problem with both automatic (not under conscious control) and controlled (under voluntary control) processing in children with Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity.

Accident Analysis & Prevention, 2013

Electroencephalography and Clinical Neurophysiology, 1987

Changes in AERP measures from childhood to adolescence were studied in 2 subgroups of hyperactive... more Changes in AERP measures from childhood to adolescence were studied in 2 subgroups of hyperactive children (25 non-delinquent and 9 delinquent) and 1 group of 34 non-delinquent normal children. The 3 groups were selected on the basis of official delinquency measures obtained 8 years after their initial evaluations. All subjects were studied using the same AERP paradigm at both points in time. The major finding was that the non-delinquent hyperactive subjects were found to have abnormal maturational changes as reflected by AERP measures while the delinquent hyperactive subjects were found to have normal maturational changes in these same measures. This suggests that these 2 hyperactive groups are on a different developmental course and that they may represent different clinical entities. Results of the comparison of cross-sectional data in childhood and again in adolescence were consistent with the concept of 2 distinct subgroups.

Twenty-seven university students (16 female) were trained on the Terminal Radar Approach Controll... more Twenty-seven university students (16 female) were trained on the Terminal Radar Approach Controller (TRACON) video game and then practiced for 20 hrs. After practice, participants performed low, medium, and high mental workload scenarios in a single session. Participants were required to handle 5, 10, or 15 aircraft within a scenario. We investigated whether measures of personality, divided attention capability, and cardiovascular functioning would improve prediction of performance beyond standard selection tests, and whether the predictors of performance would differ across workload scenarios. The predictors examined were trait anxiety, a profile score computed from the Profile of Mood States, divided attention performance from the monitoring and communications tasks of the Multi-Attribute Task Battery (MATB), and heart period, pre-ejection period, stroke volume, cardiac output, and high frequency heart rate variability obtained during resting baseline and during MATB performance. The selection tests did not account for significant TRACON performance variance in any workload scenario. However, significant gains in performance prediction were observed for each workload scenario, and the predictors differed across scenarios. Trait anxiety and divided attention performance significantly predicted TRACON performance in the low workload scenario. Cardiac output significantly predicted TRACON performance in the medium workload scenario. Heart period and pre-ejection period significantly predicted TRACON performance in the high workload scenario.

Electroencephalography and clinical neurophysiology. Supplement

Because heart rate lacks diagnosticity, an autonomic space approach for the assessment of mental ... more Because heart rate lacks diagnosticity, an autonomic space approach for the assessment of mental workload has been proposed. In addition to increasing the capability to identify differences between tasks, the autonomic space approach can be used to make better inferences about the psychological processes involved. In this paper, the approach and its application to a simulated driving task are discussed, as well as suggestions for future research and its development.

This study examined whether attention profiles from a computerized test battery relate to simulat... more This study examined whether attention profiles from a computerized test battery relate to simulated driving performance. Five attention abilities were examined in the study: sustained, divided, selective, switching, and scanning. Participants completed eight tasks in a computer-based test battery and four driving scenarios designed to tap the same attention abilities. Physiological measures were collected during the test battery and the driving scenarios. Principal components analysis (PCA) with varimax rotation extracted seven components from the test battery, including the five proposed abilities along with speed and orienting components. Component scores were used as predictors of simulated driving performance in stepwise regressions and explained a significant proportion of variance (ranging from 7% -26%) for most measures of driving performance. The speed, visual search, and divided attention components appeared as significant predictors more often than did the sustained, switc...

Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting Proceedings

The International Journal of Aviation Psychology, 1995

Psychophysiological assessment of pilot mental workload using heart rate should be augmented with... more Psychophysiological assessment of pilot mental workload using heart rate should be augmented with an autonomic space model of cardiovascular function. This model proposes that autonomic nervous system influences on the heart may change with psychological processing in ways that are not evident in heart rate. A method of mental-workload assessment was proposed that used multiple psychophysiological measures of cardiovascular responsivity to derive the underlying sympathetic and parasympathetic information needed to represent the autonomic space for heart rate. Principal-components analysis was used to extract Sympathetic and Parasympathetic components from heart period, residual heart period. respiratory sinus arrhythmia, and Traube-Hering-Mayer wave in three experiments that manipulated perceptual/central processing and physical task demands. This initial evaluation of the method concluded that the autonomic components were valid and that the components had greater diagnosticity, and for some manipulations greater sensitivity, than heart rate. These results support the contention that the Sympathetic and Parasympathetic components provided increased precision for mental-workload assessment.