Influence of Workload on Auditory Evoked Potentials in a Single-stimulus Paradigm

R. N. Roy, A. Breust, S. Bonnet, J. Porcherot, S. Charbonnier, C. Godin, A. Campagne

2015

Abstract

Mental workload can be assessed via neurophysiological markers. Temporal features such as event related potentials (ERPs) are one of those which are very often described in the literature. However, most of the studies that evaluate their sensitivity to workload use secondary tasks. Yet potentials elicited by ignored stimuli could provide mental state monitoring systems with less intrusive probing methods. For instance, auditory probing systems could be used in adaptive driving or e-learning applications. This study evaluates how workload influences auditory evoked potentials (AEPs) elicited by a single-stimulus paradigm when probes are to be ignored. Ten participants performed a Sternberg memory task on a touchpad with three levels of difficulty plus a view-only condition. In addition, they performed two ecological tasks of their choice, one deemed easy (e.g. reading novels), and the other difficult (e.g. programming). AEPs were elicited thanks to pure tones presented during the memory task retention period, and during the whole extent of the external tasks. Performance and AEPs were recorded and analyzed. Participants’ accuracy decreased linearly with increasing workload, whereas the difference in amplitude between the P3 and its adjacent components, N2 and SW, increased. This reveals the relevance of this triphasic sequence for mental workload assessment.

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Paper Citation


in Harvard Style

Roy R., Breust A., Bonnet S., Porcherot J., Charbonnier S., Godin C. and Campagne A. (2015). Influence of Workload on Auditory Evoked Potentials in a Single-stimulus Paradigm . In Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Physiological Computing Systems - Volume 1: PhyCS, ISBN 978-989-758-085-7, pages 104-111. DOI: 10.5220/0005235701040111


in Bibtex Style

@conference{phycs15,
author={R. N. Roy and A. Breust and S. Bonnet and J. Porcherot and S. Charbonnier and C. Godin and A. Campagne},
title={Influence of Workload on Auditory Evoked Potentials in a Single-stimulus Paradigm},
booktitle={Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Physiological Computing Systems - Volume 1: PhyCS,},
year={2015},
pages={104-111},
publisher={SciTePress},
organization={INSTICC},
doi={10.5220/0005235701040111},
isbn={978-989-758-085-7},
}


in EndNote Style

TY - CONF
JO - Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Physiological Computing Systems - Volume 1: PhyCS,
TI - Influence of Workload on Auditory Evoked Potentials in a Single-stimulus Paradigm
SN - 978-989-758-085-7
AU - Roy R.
AU - Breust A.
AU - Bonnet S.
AU - Porcherot J.
AU - Charbonnier S.
AU - Godin C.
AU - Campagne A.
PY - 2015
SP - 104
EP - 111
DO - 10.5220/0005235701040111