Blink-related EEG activity measures cognitive load during proactive and reactive driving

Abstract

Assessing drivers’ cognitive load is crucial for driving safety in challenging situations. This research employed the occurrence of drivers’ natural eye blinks as cues in continuously recorded EEG data to assess the cognitive workload while reactive or proactive driving. Twenty-eight participants performed either a lane-keeping task with varying levels of crosswind (reactive) or curve road (proactive). The blink event-related potentials (bERPs) and spectral perturbations (bERSPs) were analyzed to assess cognitive load variations. The study found that task load during reactive driving did not significantly impact bERPs or bERSPs, possibly due to enduring alertness for vehicle control. The proactive driving revealed significant differences in the occipital N1 component with task load, indicating the necessity to adapt the attentional resources allocation based on road demands. Also, increased steering complexity led to decreased frontal N2, parietal P3, occipital P2 amplitudes, and alpha power, requiring more cognitive resources for processing relevant information. Interestingly, the proactive and reactive driving scenarios demonstrated a significant interaction at the parietal P2 and occipital N1 for three difficulty levels. The study reveals that EEG measures related to natural eye blink behavior provide insights into the effect of cognitive load on different driving tasks, with implications for driver safety.

Less Is More: Higher-Skilled Sim Racers Allocate Significantly Less Attention to the Track Relative to the Display Features than Lower-Skilled Sim Racers

“…We also endeavoured to examine task-specific overt attention allocation across corners of the track. Previous research has found corner navigation to induce higher levels of cognitive processing while driving [ 19 ]. Therefore, fourthly, we hypothesise that that lower-skilled sim racers will have greater attention allocation than high-skilled sim racers, evidenced by longer average and total fixation durations, and a greater number of fixations in corner sectors when unadjusted for corner sector time (H4).…”