Mental Workload Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

2025, Caspian Journal of Health Research

Human resources are vital for delivering health services, and health systems cannot function effectively without sufficient numbers of skilled, motivated, and well-supported health workers. Job satisfaction of health workers is important for motivation and efficiency, as higher job satisfaction improves both employee performance and patient satisfaction. Objectives: The present study was conducted with the aim of reviewing the factors associating with the job satisfaction among health care personnel. Materials & Methods: In this systematic review, the databases of Embase, Magiran, Web of Science, Scopus, PubMed, PsycINFO, and Google Scholar were searched during the years 2000-2022 with the keywords health care personnel, job satisfaction, physicians, nurses, family medicine and Ministry of Health and Medical Education. Results: In general, the results of this study showed that various factors such as job promotion, mutual respect, job security, receiving salaries and benefits affect the job satisfaction of health care personnel and as a result increase people's loyalty to the organization and their work efficiency. Conclusion: Considering the scope and diversity of the tasks and goals of the Ministry of Health and Medical Education, treatment and medical education and considering the importance of job satisfaction in providing, maintaining and advancing these goals, the job motivation of professors can be increased by removing and reducing the factors that cause dissatisfaction of these people.

2025

In this study driver’s brain activity was measured by using functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) when using driving assistance systems such as Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC) system and Lane Keeping Assistance (LKA) system. The fNIRS measurement system detects the radiated near-infrared rays, and measures relative variations of oxygenated hemoglobin (oxy-Hb) and deoxygenated hemoglobin (deoxy-Hb) based on those absorbencies. Subjects followed a leading vehicle, which had a certain speed pattern including stop and go situations, with and without ACC system. The activity in the dorsolateral pre-frontal cortex (DLPFC) of the drivers without the ACC was modulated by accelerating and decelerating the car, whereas this was not the case for the drivers using the ACC. Also, the overall DLPFC as measured by fNIRS was lower when drivers were using the ACC compared to when they were not using ACC. These results may reflect a difference in mental workload between the two conditions.

2025

A number of researches demonstrated that artists or experts on visual art show high ability in visual processing of objects (Winner, 1992; Kozbelt, 2001). The aim of this study is to evaluate the performance of artists on imagery production tasks (measured using vividness of imagery, mental rotation, spatial imagery and mental synthesis) and drawing production tasks. Moreover, we expect that training in visual arts affects significantly the performance on cognitive, spatial, imagery and graphicmotor tasks. Artists compared to non-artists should perform better on drawing tasks involving perceptual ability, visuo-motor skills and ability to make good representational decisions (Cohen & Bennett, 1997).

2025, International journal of occupational hygiene

Mental workload is an important issue in occupational health. This study aimed to determine the validity and reliability of the Rating Scale Mental Effort (RSME), Integrated Workload Scale (IWS), and Overall Workload Scale (OW) in Iran. This study was conducted on 100 male students of Iran University of Medical Sciences. The forward-backward translation method was used to evaluate the linguistic validity of the scales. Then the scales were presented to six ergonomics and occupational health experts to assess the content validity of the scales. Internal validity of the scales was assessed by correlating mental workload scale scores with reaction times on a criterion task. Finally, multiple sessions of a hybrid memory-search task were performed to determine the reliability of the scales. There was prefect agreement among the experts regarding of all three scales. Content Validity Index and Content Validity Ratio were 1 for each three scales. About the reliability of the scales, the Pearson correlation coefficients between the scale scores in the test and retest phases were 96, 88, and 84 for RSME, IWS, and OW, respectively. Finally, Validity and reliability of the scales were approved and It seems that these scales can be used for measuring self-reported mental workload.

2025

The U.S. Army Aviation Combined Arms Training Strategy highlights the use of Training Aids, Devices, Simulations, and Simulators (TADSS) as key, low cost tools to prepare Army aviation forces for future combat. A prominent component of this strategy is an increasing reliance on games-for-training. Game-based systems are capable of supporting training and assessment of mission procedures and situational judgement tasks. However, little research exists on the capabilities of the specific types of game-based systems for supporting Army aviation collective training. The present study evaluated the effectiveness of the Virtual Battlespace 3 and Microsoft Flight Simulator game-based training environments for a set of collective air assault mission tasks. Study participants consisted of previously qualified Army aviators recruited from various U.S. Army Aviation Center of Excellence (USAACE) schoolhouses located at Fort Rucker, Alabama. An air assault mission scenario, consisting of a set ...

2025

La seguridad en las organizaciones es un area de investigacion cada vez mas relevante en la intervencion psicosocial en las organizaciones. El enfoque sociotecnico representa la orientacion actual en el estudio de los sistemas de gestion de seguridad en las organizaciones. El desarrollo y evaluacion de programas de formacion, desde esta perspectiva, consiste en una estrategia central para la mejora del nivel de seguridad. Dentro de esta linea, el objeto de este trabajo consiste en presentar un programa de formacion en seguridad desarrollado por un grupo internacional de empresas e investigadores. Ademas, se muestran rersultados sobre dos de los criterios usados para la evaluacion del programa: actitudes y clima relacionados con la seguridad. Se aplico un diseño cuasi experimental de 3 (empresas), por 2 (grupos, experimental y control), por 2 medidas (antes y despues), a un total de 131 sujetos. Los resultados indican una mejora significativa de las actitudes hacia la seguridad solo ...

2025, PSYCHOLOGIA

Advanced technologies have enabled the choice of either visual or auditory formats for avionics and surface transportation displays. Methods of assessing the mental workload imposed by displays of different formats are critical to their successful implementation. Towards this end a series of investigations were conducted with the following aims: 1) developing analogous auditory and visual versions of a secondary task that could be used to compare display modalities; and 2) to compare the sensitivity of neurophysiological, behavioral and subjective indices of workload. Experiments 1 and 2 confirmed that analogous auditory and visual secondary oddball discrimination tasks were of equivalent difficulty as indicated by P300 amplitude, RT, accuracy and subjective ratings of workload. Experiments 1-3 revealed that RT and accuracy for target detections were generally more sensitive to changes in primary task difficulty than P300 responses and subjective ratings. However, Experiment 3 indicated that P300 amplitude was sensitive to increased perceptual demands (resulting from driving in heavy fog versus clear visibility) not revealed by changes in either behavioral or subjective indices. Together the results of the current investigations indicate that a battery of assessment techniques will provide the most sensitive assessment of workload in complex environments.

2025, International journal of occupational hygiene

2025, Journal of Holistic Nursing and Midwifery

One of the most important factors related to the quality of care is the proper communication between nurses and patients. One of the factors that affects patient safety is the working environment. Objective: This study aimed to determine the use of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) methods by nurses in intensive care units (ICUs) of hospitals in Ahvaz, southwest of Iran, and assess its relationship with work environment and patient safety culture. Materials and Methods: This is a correlational and cross-sectional study. Using a census sampling method, 378 nurses working in the ICUs of hospitals affiliated to Ahvaz Jundishapur University of Medical Sciences were selected, of whom 249 were eligible to participate in the study. Data were collected from May to June 2022 using the hospital survey on patient safety culture (HSOPSC), nursing work index (NWI) and an AAC method use questionnaire. The association between the study variables was assessed using Spearman's correlation test. P<0.05 were considered statistically significant. Results: Among participants, 87.1% were female, and 85.1% had a bachelor's degree. The most common method of communication was verbal communication, as 61 nurses (24.5%) reported they "always" used this method, while it was "often" used by 79(31.7%) nurses. Moreover, 93 nurses (37.3%) reported that the nurse call bell was the most commonly used tool for communication. Spearman's test results showed a significant relationship between some NWI variables and the use of AAC methods, including a significant relationship between speaking valve use for communication and adequacy of resources and staffing (r=0.380, p=0.001) and between communication with sign language and overall perception of patient safety (r=-0.330, P=0.001). There was also a significant relationship between many HSOPSC variables and the use of AAC methods (P<0.05). Conclusion: Promoting a patient safety culture and improving the working environment can improve nurses' use of AAC methods in ICUs.

2025, HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe)

2025, European Journal of Public Health

Background: Studies comparing socioeconomic inequalities in health using several health indicators are scarce. Therefore, this study aims to compare the shape and magnitude of occupational class inequalities across key domains of health, i.e. the subjective, functional and medical domains. Additionally, we examine whether physical or mental workload will affect these inequalities, and whether these effects are specific to particular health indicators. Methods: Cross-sectional survey data from the Helsinki Health Study in 2000 and 2001 were used. Each year employees of the City of Helsinki, reaching 40, 45, 50, 55 and 60 years received a mailed questionnaire. 6243 employees responded (80% women, response rate 68%). The socioeconomic indicator was occupational social class. Nine health indicators were included: self-rated health, pain or ache, GHQ-12 mental well-being, limiting long-standing illness, SF-36 physical and mental health functioning, Rose angina symptoms, circulatory diseases and mental problems. Prevalence percentages, odds ratios and inequality indices from logistic regression analysis were calculated. Results: Occupational class inequalities were found for self-rated health, pain or ache, limiting long-standing illness, physical health functioning, angina symptoms, and circulatory diseases. Physical or mental workload did not account for these inequalities. Inequalities were non-existent or slightly reversed for GHQ-12 mental well-being, SF-36 mental health functioning and mental problems. Conclusion: Expected occupational class inequalities in health among both women and men were found for global and physical health but not for mental health. The observed inequalities could not be attributed to physical or mental workload.

2025

Efficient traffic management relies on up-to-date information about the state of the road network. As more traffic and other data sources become available, more accurate estimation and prediction of road traffic conditions utilising all data sources is essential to reduce congestion and increase traffic safety. This is one strand of the INTRO (Intelligent Roads) project. The INTRO project is aimed at demonstrating how safety, capacity, road operation and maintenance problems can be alleviated by the use of existing and new sensor technologies in a holistic way, to add "intelligence" to road networks. It is a three year project which started in March 2005, with a budget of 3.5 million Euro supported by the European Commission under the 6th Framework Programme. The INTRO project consists of three technical work packages (WP2: Novel concepts of surface safety monitoring; WP3: Pavement conditions from intelligent pavements and intelligent vehicles; and WP4: Traffic and safety ...

2025, USENIX Security Symposium

Advanced Persistence Threat (APT) attacks use various strategies and techniques to move laterally within an enterprise environment; however, the existing strategies and techniques have limitations such as requiring elevated permissions, creating new connections, performing new authentications, or requiring process injections. Based on these characteristics, many host and network-based solutions have been proposed to prevent or detect such lateral movement attempts. In this paper, we present a novel stealthy lateral movement strategy, ShadowMove, in which only established connections between systems in an enterprise network are misused for lateral movements. It has a set of unique features such as requiring no elevated privilege, no new connection, no extra authentication, and no process injection, which makes it stealthy against stateof-the-art detection mechanisms. ShadowMove is enabled by a novel socket duplication approach that allows a malicious process to silently abuse TCP connections established by benign processes. We design and implement ShadowMove for current Windows and Linux operating systems. To validate the feasibility of ShadowMove, we build several prototypes that successfully hijack three kinds of enterprise protocols, FTP, Microsoft SQL, and Window Remote Management, to perform lateral movement actions such as copying malware to the next target machine and launching malware on the target machine. We also confirm that our prototypes cannot be detected by existing host and network-based solutions, such as five top-notch anti-virus products (McAfee, Norton, Webroot, Bitdefender, and Windows Defender), four IDSes (Snort, OS-SEC, Osquery, and Wazuh), and two Endpoint Detection and Response systems (CrowdStrike Falcon Prevent and Cisco AMP).

2025

This study investigated the effects of synthetic vision system (SVS) concepts and advanced flight controls on single pilot performance (SPP). Specifically, we evaluated the benefits and interactions of two levels of terrain portrayal, guidance symbology, and control-system response type on SPP in the context of lower-landing minima (LLM) approaches. Performance measures consisted of flight technical error (FTE) and pilot perceived workload. In this study, pilot rating, control type, and guidance symbology were not found to significantly affect FTE or workload. It is likely that transfer from prior experience, limited scope of the evaluation task, specific implementation limitations, and limited sample size were major factors in obtaining these results.

2025, … de psicología del trabajo y de …

El clima organizacional y los climas específicos de diversos aspectos organizacionales, como el clima de seguridad han suscitado abundante literatura, tanto teórica como empírica, y su utilidad aplicada resulta evidente. El clima de seguridad, el objetivo de este artículo, nace de los trabajos seminales de Zohar (1980) y ha sido empleado en la literatura sobre seguridad laboral, bien como antecedente de la siniestralidad laboral, como aspecto a medir para una correcta evaluación de la seguridad en la empresa, o incluso como consecuente de características y acciones organizacionales tales como tipo de empresa, tamaño, inversiones en seguridad. No obstante, el desarrollo teórico del concepto y la correspondiente evaluación empírica de esas características teóricas no han ido en paralelo, especialmente en nuestro contexto. El objetivo de este trabajo es poner a prueba empíricamente las características teóricas principales del clima de seguridad mediante técnicas estadísticas multinivel, idóneas para este diseño de investigación. En concreto los objetivos son: a) someter a prueba la característica de percepción compartida del clima de seguridad; b) poner a prueba la capacidad del clima como correlato de accidentes, su capacidad predictiva; c) estudiar la importancia relativa de las distintas dimensiones de clima en nuestro contexto industrial, una vez controlados estadísticamente aspectos "físicos" de la seguridad laboral.

2025, The Journal of Defense Modeling and Simulation: Applications, Methodology, Technology

This paper advances live (L), virtual (V), and constructive (C) simulation methodologies by introducing a new LVC simulation framework for the development of air combat tactics, techniques, and procedures (TTP). In the framework, TTP is developed iteratively in separate C-, V-, and L-simulation stages. This allows the utilization of the strengths of each simulation class while avoiding the challenges of pure LVC simulations. The C-stage provides the optimal TTP with respect to the probabilities of survival ( Ps) and kill ( Pk) of aircraft without considering the human–machine interaction (HMI). In the V-stage, the optimal TTP is modified by assessing its applicability with Pk and Ps, as well as HMI measures regarding pilots’ situation awareness, mental workload, and TTP adherence. In the L-stage, real aircraft are used to evaluate whether the developed TTP leads to acceptable Pk, Ps, and HMI measures in a real-life environment. The iterative nature of the framework enables that V- o...

2025, IISE transactions on occupational ergonomics and human factors

When comparing a typical exam room layout to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA's) new exam room design, with respect to the exam room computing, primary care providers experienced significantly less mental workload and greater situation awareness when using the new exam room design. Further, providers rated the new exam room layout significantly higher in terms of being integrated with their clinical workflow and spent significantly more time in screen sharing activities with the patient. A more thoughtful design of the exam room layout with respect to the placement and physical design of the computing set-up may reduce provider cognitive effort and enhance aspects of patient centeredness by viewing the computer and electronic health record (EHR) it displays as an important mediator between provider and patient. This was achieved by using an all-in-one computer attached to a wall mount that moves the monitor along three axes, allowing for optimal screen positioning and adjustable depending upon the scenario.

2025, Asian journal of social sciences and humanities

The aim of this study was to evaluate the sensitivity of a range of EEG indices to time-on-task effects and to a workload manipulation (cueing), during performance of a resource-limited vigilance task. Effects of task period and cueing on performance and subjective state response were consistent with previous vigilance studies and with resource theory. Two EEG indices – the Task Load Index (TLI) and global lower frequency (LF) alpha power – showed effects of task period and cueing similar to those seen with correct detections. Across four successive task periods, the TLI declined and LF alpha power increased. Cueing increased TLI and decreased LF alpha. Other indices – the Engagement Index (EI), frontal theta and upper frequency (UF) alpha failed to show these effects. However, EI and frontal theta were sensitive to interactive effects of task period and cueing, which may correspond to a stronger anxiety response to the uncued task

2025, Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting

Insider Threats (ITs) are hard to identify because of their knowledge of the organization and motivation to avoid detection. One approach to detecting ITs utilizes Active Indicators (AI), stimuli that elicit a characteristic response from the insider. The present research implemented this approach within a simulation of financial investigative work. A sequence of AIs associated with accessing a locked file was introduced into an ongoing workflow. Participants allocated to an insider role accessed the file illicitly. Eye tracking metrics were used to differentiate insiders and control participants performing legitimate role. Data suggested that ITs may show responses suggestive of strategic concealment of interest and emotional stress. Such findings may provide the basis for a cognitive engineering approach to IT detection.

2024, Behavioral Neuroscience

The effects of executive load on working memory performance during sleep inertia following morning or afternoon naps were assessed using a mixed design with nap /wake as a betweensubject factor and morning/afternoon condition as a within-subject factor. Thirty-two healthy adults (mean 22.5 ± 3.0 years) attended two laboratory sessions following a night of restricted sleep (6 hrs), and at first visit, were randomly assigned to the Nap or Wake group. Working memory (n-back) and subjective workload were assessed approximately 5 and 25 minutes after 90 minute morning and afternoon nap opportunities and at the corresponding times in the Wake condition. Actigraphically-assessed nocturnal sleep duration, subjective sleepiness and psychomotor vigilance performance prior to daytime assessments did not vary across conditions. Afternoon naps showed shorter EEG assessed sleep latencies, longer sleep duration, and more Slow Wave Sleep than morning naps. Working memory performance deteriorated, and subjective mental workload increased at higher executive loadings. After afternoon naps, participants performed less well on more executive-function intensive working memory tasks (i.e. 3-back), but waking and napping participants performed equally well on simpler tasks. After some 30 minutes of cognitive activity, there were no longer performance differences between the waking and napping groups. Subjective Task Difficulty and Mental Effort requirements were less affected by sleep inertia and dissociated from objective measures when participants had napped in the afternoon. We conclude that executive functions take longer to return to asymptotic performance following sleep than does performance of simpler tasks which are less reliant on executive functions.

2024, Aviation, space, and environmental medicine

The ability to continuously and unobtrusively monitor levels of task engagement and mental workload in an operational environment could be useful in identifying more accurate and efficient methods for humans to interact with technology. This information could also be used to optimize the design of safer, more efficient work environments that increase motivation and productivity. The present study explored the feasibility of monitoring electroencephalo-graphic (EEG) indices of engagement and workload acquired unobtrusively and quantified during performance of cognitive tests. EEG was acquired from 80 healthy participants with a wireless sensor headset (F3-F4,C3-C4,Cz-POz,F3-Cz,Fz-C3,Fz-POz) during tasks including: multi-level forward/backward-digit-span, grid-recall, trails, mental-addition, 20-min 3-Choice Vigilance, and image-learning and memory tests. EEG metrics for engagement and workload were calculated for each 1 -s of EEG. Across participants, engagement but not workload decr...

2024, Applied Ergonomics

This study examines mental workload and performance in simulated high-speed ship navigation. Two navigation methods were compared based on an electronic chart display and information system (ECDIS) and a conventional system using paper charts. Twenty naval cadets navigated in high-fidelity simulators through a 50 nautical mile course with varying levels of difficulty. Results showed that ECDIS navigation significantly improved course-keeping performance, but reduced the total amount of communication on the bridge. No differences were observed in subjective workload between groups. Heart rate variability and skin conductance measurements indicated higher workload in conventional navigation, but the differences between groups were not significant.

2024

Log (localizer RMSE) =-2.26 + 0.07 (z-clutter score) 2 + 0.43 (leg)-1.41 (display) +0.43 (workload) +0.95 (Luminance)-1.81 (contrast)-1.12 (density) (R 2 =0.36, p<0.0001) Log (localizer RMSE) =-2.16 + 0.19 (z-TLX) + 0.44 (leg)-1.38 (display) + 0.37 (workload) + 0.99 (luminance)-1.70 (contrast)-1.17 (density) (R 2 =0.37, p<0.0001) Objectives 1. Perform preliminary validation of multidimensional measure of display clutter. 2. Assess influence of: (a) pilot experience; (b) HUD configuration; (c) flight segment; and (d) workload on perceptions of display clutter and cognitive load, and flight task performance. 3. Model HUD clutter scores in terms of display visual properties (e.g., lumens, contrast, active pixels). • Model pilot performance in terms of perceived clutter and cognitive load. • Identify clutter descriptor terms most used by pilots with range of experience to define clutter under different conditions.

2024, Applied Science and Engineering Journal for Advanced Research

With the improvement of computer, artificial intelligence, information technology and other technical levels, the relationship between man-machine environment systems is more complicated and diversified. The optimization, iteration and development of the new generation of intelligent equipment system and human-computer interaction interface put forward higher requirements for ensuring the safety of personnel, improving the efficiency of human-computer interaction and improving the efficiency of the system. Such as intelligent cabin adaptive cognitive decision aid system, how to adopt intelligent information display and human-computer interaction, optimize information processing, strengthen situational awareness; How to effectively present information and improve the efficiency of human-computer interaction, so that the system has good security, applicability and maximize its effectiveness; How to deal with man-machine matching and man-machine collaboration problems, so as to improve the efficiency of man-machine/unmanned collaborative work. Human factors throughout the life cycle of equipment systems must be fully considered. The human factor is considered in the system design, so that people, machines and the environment can work together and adapt to each other, so as to achieve benign interaction and feedback between people and equipment and interface and complete the full transmission and communication of human-machine intelligent interaction information. The development of new aircraft human-computer interaction systems combined with new technological methods has also gradually changed the role of pilots and staff. From the system operator gradually into the monitor and decision maker, especially with the improvement of the degree of intelligent flight, information technology, advanced complex airborne equipment is increasing, the amount of information that operators need to deal with is also increasing, and the allowed time for judgment and decision is very short, and the mental resources that pilots bear are gradually rising. As the mental load is a key factor affecting the allocation of cognitive tasks, when encountering emergency situations, the mental load overload caused by the increase of information processing tasks often occurs, which seriously affects the task performance of operators, physical and psychological comfort and flight safety, and thus affects the efficiency and safety of the entire aircraft man-machine system. This requires us to conduct real-time analysis of human-computer interaction situational awareness, especially the individual cognitive state as an uncontrollable factor.

2024, Proceedings of the 17th International Technical Conference on the Enhanced Safety of Vehicles (ESV)

2024

The design of active safety systems capable of helping avoiding a crash or reducing the collision severity requires data on how drivers behave in accident situations. These systems must be triggered when drivers actually need assistance. They must enhance insufficient reactions and limit unsuitable ones without being in conflict with drivers' natural behavior. The Laboratory of Accidentology, Biomechanics and human behavior, PSA Peugeot Citroen - Renault (LAB), has conducted experiments on driving simulators and on test tracks to analyze driver's behavior in emergency situations. Two of these experiments concern front-to-rear accident situations, each one involving more than 100 representative common drivers. The first study was carried out on a simulator with different accident scenarios: an adverse vehicle stopped or driving slowly at the top of a hill, a vehicle coming into the driver's lane from a parking area, or a vehicle driving in front of the subject then sudden...

2024, Journal of Occupational Rehabilitation

2024

We report, as part of the EMBC meeting Cognitive State Assessment (CSA) competition 2011, an empirical comparison using robust cross-validation of the performance of eleven computational approaches to real-time electroencephalography (EEG) based mental workload monitoring on Multi-Attribute Task Battery data from eight subjects. We propose a new approach, Overcomplete Spectral Regression, that combines several potentially advantageous attributes and empirically demonstrate its superior performance on these data compared to the ten other CSA methods tested. We discuss results from computational, neuroscience and experimentation points of view.

2024, Anales de Psicología

Efectos de la carga de tarea y las capacidades cognitivas sobre el rendimiento y la carga mental subjetiva de una tarea de seguimiento. Resumen: El objetivo de esta investigación fue determinar los efectos del nivel de inteligencia general y del perfil aptitudinal de los individuos sobre el rendimiento y las evaluaciones subjetivas de carga mental de una tarea de seguimiento. A pesar de que la mayoría de los autores señalan que la carga mental depende tanto de las características de la tarea como de la capacidad de los individuos, la investigación dirigida a determinar la influencia real de los factores de diferencias individuales es muy escasa. En este estudio se recogieron medidas del rendimiento y de la carga mental subjetiva en una tarea de seguimiento con diferentes niveles de dificultad. Los resultados mostraron efectos significativos, simples y de interacción, de los factores de complejidad de la tarea tanto sobre el rendimiento como sobre la carga mental subjetiva. La aptitud espacial fue la que mostró un mayor efecto mediador, particularmente sobre la carga mental. Los sujetos con un mayor nivel aptitudinal registraron evaluaciones de carga mental más elevadas que los menos aptos, independientemente del instrumento utilizado para medir la carga mental. Finalmente, los sujetos más aptos alcanzaron niveles de rendimiento más altos que los menos aptos, especialmente en la condición de seguimiento más difícil. Palabras clave: Carga mental subjetiva; capacidades cognitivas; tarea de seguimiento; rendimiento.

2024, Optometry and vision science : official publication of the American Academy of Optometry

Investigations of infantile nystagmus syndrome (INS) at center or at the null position have reported that INS worsens when visual demand is combined with internal states, e.g. stress. Visual function and INS parameters such as foveation time, frequency, amplitude, and intensity can also be influenced by gaze position. We hypothesized that increases from baseline in visual demand and mental load would affect INS parameters at the null position differently than at other gaze positions. Eleven participants with idiopathic INS were asked to determine the direction of Tumbling-E targets, whose visual demand was varied through changes in size and contrast, using a staircase procedure. Targets appeared between ±25° in 5° steps. The task was repeated with both mental arithmetic and time restriction to impose higher mental load, confirmed through subjective ratings and concurrent physiological measurements. Within-subject comparisons were limited to the null and 15° away from it. No signific...

2024, Virtual Reality

In this study, we compare subjective onlineand post-immersion measures. Although its relevance appears obvious from a theoretical and applied research perspective, this question has not yet been addressed in previous studies. In addition, we also compare verbally and pictorially anchored scales. These factors were measured in different contents using a 2 9 2 9 2 design. We manipulated time of measure (online vs. ex post), type of measure (verbal vs. visual), and content (language vs. languagefree). Participants (N = 162) evaluated two video clips in terms of presence. No differences between averaged online-and post-immersion measures were found and online judgments did not interfere with the sensation of presence. In line with findings from other areas of research, the use of pictorially anchored items has major advantages. Our results suggest that those items require less mental workload and assess the sensation of presence more directly than verbally anchored items. We discuss the theoretical implications of our findings.

2024, Transportation Research Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour

We present data from an ongoing research project on the cognitive, emotional and neuropsychological basis of risk behaviour. The main aim of the project is to build a model of risk behaviour so that if we know certain cognitive, behavioural and emotional variables, we will be able to predict decisions made in the face of uncertainty and risk, with the final goal of designing programs for evaluating, preventing and controlling risk behaviour. The objective of the present study was to look for individual differences in hazard perception during a static riding simulation and their relationship with mental workload. We used a multidimensional methodology, including behavioural, subjective and physiological data. The behavioural measures were obtained in a static riding simulation during eight hazard situations. We evaluated whether eye activity measures correlated with cognitive workload and different types of risky behaviours. Eye movement parameters were measured using a video-based eye tracking system. We found that risk-prone individuals showed specific patterns of risky behaviours and that peak of saccadic velocity and subjective mental workload indexes were both reliable indicators of risk proneness. Mental workload was higher for participants showing attitudes to risk behaviours probably because of a lack of conscious awareness of specific cues indicating dangerous scenarios.

2024, IFAC-PapersOnLine

Industry 5.0 addresses the human challenges of Industry 4.0 as a human-centric solution, placing the worker's well-being at the centre of the production process. If, on the one hand, the last technologies support operator 5.0 to embrace the collaborative potential of human-machine cooperation, on the other hand, the complexity, as well as the rapid evolution of new technologies, could have the potential to produce immediate stress reaction leading to reduce the workers' well-being. Recent studies have proved that the maintenance area is experiencing many innovations in terms of approaches and technologies. In this field, the rapid progress of technological equipment is leading to an increase in the human operators' mental workload. This paper presents preliminary concepts and objectives of a Decision Support System (DSS) for the Diagnosis and Evaluation of Maintenance Operations. The DSS intends to assist industrial professionals and stakeholders in maintenance tasks characterised by significant cognitive demands. Considering variables such as task complexity and the mental and physical condition of operators involved in a maintenance task, the DSS will provide real-time recommendations for selecting the most suitable operators by promoting a gradual technology introduction, increasing industrial performance, and ensuring the well-being of the workers.

2024, Revista eidos

La presente investigación buscó determinar la presencia de carga mental y su relación con el Síndrome de Burnout en docentes a tiempo completo de una universidad privada de Quito. Se trata de un estudio epidemiológico analítico transversal y descriptivo. La población de estudio está constituida por 134 docentes a tiempo completo. El levantamiento de datos se realizó a través del Cuestionario de Burnout de Maslach para Docentes (MBI-Ed) y la Escala Subjetiva de Carga Mental de Trabajo (ESCAM).Para el análisis y procesamiento de datos se empleó el programa estadístico S.P.S.S 20.0 versión Windows. Se encontró que la carga mental que poseen los docentes es media-alta teniendo en cuenta las valoraciones de las dimensiones: Demandas cognitivas y complejidad de la tarea; Características de la tarea; Organización temporal del trabajo; Ritmo de trabajo y Consecuencias para la salud. El 26,06% de los docentes presentó Agotamiento emocional, 4,59% Despersonalización y un 39,5% se sintieron realizados personalmente. Mientras que el 23,8% de los docentes participantes sufren niveles preocupantes de Burnout que van entre los niveles de "extremo y bastante". Se presenta una caracterización de los docentes con mayor vulnerabilidad a padecer algunas de las dimensiones del Burnout de acuerdo con las variables medidas.

2024, Eidos

2024, Brain Sciences

Subjects' interaction is the core of most human activities. This is the reason why a lack of coordination is often the cause of missing goals, more than individual failure. While there are different subjective and objective measures to assess the level of mental effort required by subjects while facing a situation that is getting harder, that is, mental workload, to define an objective measure based on how and if team members are interacting is not so straightforward. In this study, behavioral, subjective and synchronized electroencephalographic data were collected from couples involved in a cooperative task to describe the relationship between task difficulty and team coordination, in the sense of interaction aimed at cooperatively performing the assignment. Multiple-brain connectivity analysis provided information about the whole interacting system. The results showed that averaged local properties of a brain network were affected by task difficulty. In particular, strength changed significantly with task difficulty and clustering coefficients strongly correlated with the workload itself. In particular, a higher workload corresponded to lower clustering values over the central and parietal brain areas. Such results has been interpreted as less efficient organization of the network when the subjects' activities, due to high workload tendencies, were less coordinated.

2024, Theoretical Issues in Ergonomics Science

Prior research has shown contradictory results regarding the relationship between physical performance and cognitive load, and a lack of task environment models to compromise stability recovery. The objectives of this study were to assess influence of multitasking involving locomotion and concurrent cognitive demands as well as locomotor internal situation model formulation on proactive gait control for hazards. Twenty-four participants navigated a virtual walking environment including locomotion hazards (puddles, potholes). Three variables were manipulated, including a-priori knowledge (three levels of training fidelity), navigation aid type (instructionbased, map-based), and physical cueing (visual only, visual and physical). Significant differences in weight acceptance force and centre of pressure slope suggest that higher environment knowledge and lower cognitive load lead to greater proactive control. Participants adopted a three-stride advance preparation strategy to accommodate hazards. The experiment demonstrated accurate task environment knowledge and situation processing to dictate gait control for hazards when performing concurrent cognitive tasks.

2024, Theoretical Issues in Ergonomics Science

The objective of this study was to assess an empirical approach to the characterisation of mental models in a multitasking scenario. A virtual reality task was used, in which participants were required to attend to and detect multiple types of perceptual events occurring randomly in time while carrying on steady physical activity (walking on a treadmill). Based on a cognitive task analysis, different forms of mental models for performing the task were hypothesised. Responses to situation awareness (SA) probes delivered during experiment trials, mental workload ratings and task performance measures were collected and compared with response patterns expected for specific mental model types. Results demonstrated utility of categorical SA responses for identifying different mental model types. However, in the multitasking scenario, the process of developing 'good' SA was significantly influenced by the physical and cognitive task demands and the progressive development of accurate isomorphic mental models of event distributions appeared to be restricted by this. Possible applications of the results of this study include the development of training programmes for mobile, visual inspection tasks, such as airport roving security patrols, towards accurate mental model development and promoting detection of critical events.

2024, Aerospace medicine and human performance

Attention plays a central role in cognitive processing; ineffective attention may induce accidents in flight operations. The objective of the current research was to examine military pilots' attention distributions between chasing a moving target and a stationary target. In the current research, 37 mission-ready F-16 pilots participated. Subjects' eye movements were collected by a portable head-mounted eye-tracker during tactical training in a flight simulator. The scenarios of chasing a moving target (air-to-air) and a stationary target (air-to-surface) consist of three operational phases: searching, aiming, and lock-on to the targets. The findings demonstrated significant differences in pilots' percentage of fixation during the searching phase between air-to-air (M = 37.57, SD = 5.72) and air-to-surface (M = 33.54, SD = 4.68). Fixation duration can indicate pilots' sustained attention to the trajectory of a dynamic target during air combat maneuvers. Aiming at the ...

2024, Health in Emergencies and Disasters Quarterly (HDQ)

Background: Mental workload (MW) and occupational fatigue (OF) are among the harmful factors in the working environment of the emergency nursing profession, which can be related to the quality of care provided and job stress (JS) in emergency nurses. Accordingly, this study investigates the relationship between MW, MF and JS in emergency nurses in 2023 in Ardabil, Iran. Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study was conducted by measuring OF, JS and MW of emergency nurses in hospitals of Ardabil Province, Iran. Information was collected through a checklist that recorded the demographic information in addition to the NASA task load index, JS by Orly and Giordano and the Swedish OF inventory questionnaires. The statistical analysis was conducted by the SPSS software, version 22. Results: The mean mental state of the participants was 16.7±3.6. Meanwhile, 40% of nurses had a high mental load. The mean condition of the OF was high (49.02±4.2; 23.2%). Regarding JS, 45.5%, 25.9% and 28.6% were the high, medium, and low levels, respectively. A direct and significant relationship was detected between MW, JS and OF (P<0.05). Conclusion: The mean MW, JS and OF among emergency nurses were high. Almost half and about a quarter of the emergency nurses are under JS and OF, respectively. Therefore, to improve emergency nurses' health conations, and productivity, and create safe conditions in emergencies, the control and management of this harmful occupational factor should be under continuous monitoring.

2024, Master's Thesis

The study aims to measure attitude processes when using simulators and subjective experiences after use by comparing a VR-based immersive simulator and a classic non-immersive simulator. The target groups are the conscripts in the Parola Armored Brigade of the Finnish Defense Forces, who will receive training in using an anti-aircraft machine gun with the help of virtual reality. Both simulators highlighted commendable traits, such as prompt responsiveness to user actions and awareness of control devices. The VR simulator's propensity to induce more pronounced simulator sickness symptoms occurred similarly in both simulators, suggesting common physiological responses across different simulator types. Interestingly, participants in the VR simulator found it easier to control events and manipulate objects, leading to better engagement than in real-life scenarios. These findings illuminate the advantages and limitations of VR training with augmented cues, offering valuable insights for refinement and future research endeavors.

2024

2024, Transportation Research Part C: Emerging Technologies

Explanations given by automation are often used to promote automation adoption. However, it remains unclear whether explanations promote acceptance of automated vehicles (AVs). In this study, we conducted a within-subject experiment in a driving simulator with 32 participants, using four different conditions. The four conditions included: (1) no explanation, (2) explanation given before or (3) after the AV acted and (4) the option for the driver to approve or disapprove the AV's action after hearing the explanation. We examined four AV outcomes: trust, preference for AV, anxiety and mental workload. Results suggest that explanations provided before an AV acted were associated with higher trust in and preference for the AV, but there was no difference in anxiety and workload. These results have important implications for the adoption of AVs.

2024

This paper present a proposal for measuring available mental resources during the accomplishment of a task. Our proposal consists in measuring emotions provoked by perceived self-efficacy in the execution of the task. Self-efficacy is one of the most important factors that affect the resources that a person puts at the disposal of the execution of the task. When a person perceives that he/she is not being effective he/she will activate more resources to improve his performance. This self-efficacy will be reflected in the emotions that the person experiences. A good efficacy will provoke positive emotions and a bad efficacy negative emotions. The results of our study show that poor execution leads to negative emotions and psychophysiological activation as measured by pupil dilation. According to these results we propose that a possible method for measuring available resources during the execution of the task could be online measuring of emotions.