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Journal Article

Citation

Backs RW, Lenneman JK, Wetzel JM, Green P. Hum. Factors 2003; 45(4): 525-538.

Affiliation

Department of Psychology, Central Michigan University, Mount Pleasant, Michigan 48859, USA. richard.w.backs@cmich.edu

Copyright

(Copyright © 2003, Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

15055451

Abstract

Cardiac (heart rate, pre-ejection period, and respiratory sinus arrhythmia), performance, and visual demand measures of driver workload were obtained from 15 male university students who drove a simulated course multiple times at a fixed speed of 72.4 km/h. The course contained curves of 3 different radii (582, 291, and 194 m) and was driven with and without visual occlusion of the road scene to manipulate driver workload. Visual occlusion of the road scene significantly reduced driving performance but did not affect the cardiac measures. Driving performance significantly deteriorated and visual demand significantly increased as curve radius decreased. The cardiac measures were differentially affected by curve radius, indicating different modes of autonomic control for the 291-m curve as compared with the 582- and 194-m curves. The patterns of dissociation across the cardiac, performance, and visual demand measures were interpreted as being capable of isolating the perceptual demands of driving from the central and motor processing demands. A potential application of this research is that the combination of psychophysiological and visual occlusion methodologies are a powerful research tool to assess performance and processing resource cost trade-offs associated with using advanced in-vehicle technologies.

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