Psychophysiological Stress Response in an Underwater Evacuation Training

Abstract

Background: This research aimed to analyze the psychophysiological stress response of air crews in an underwater evacuation training. Materials and Methods: We analyzed in 36 participants (39.06 ± 9.01 years) modifications in the rating of perceived exertion (RPE), subjective stress perception (SSP), heart rate (HR), blood oxygen saturation (BOS), cortical arousal (critical flicker fusion threshold, CFFT), heart rate variability (HRV), spirometry, isometric hand strength (IHS), and short-term memory (ST-M) before and after an underwater evacuation training. Results: The maneuver produced a significant (p ≤ 0.05) increase in the SSP, RPE, Mean HR and maximum HR (Max HR), and a decrease in minimum HR (Min HR) and HRV. Conclusion: An underwater evacuation training produced an increase in the sympathetic nervous system modulation, elevating the psychophysiological stress response of the air crews, not negatively affecting their cortical arousal.

Portable Biosensors for Psychophysiological Stress Monitoring of a Helicopter Crew

“…The rate of perceived exertion of the military participants was also higher than that of the control participants, probably due to the physical demands of their different roles during the flights, in line with the decrease in the FEV1, PEF, and urine proteins [1,5,7]; as the control did not perform any activity during the flights, the perceived exertion was lower. On the other hand, we found a significant decrease in the HR of the military participants in flights due to the experience, special training, and habituation to the flight stress, as other studies have previously shown [1,6,9,28,29]. We also found a significant decrease in cortical arousal in the control participants, but not in the military participants.…”

“…Independently of the combat situation, in military deployments, there are unpredictable and unknown hazards that elicit a stress response in the organism [2]. This response activates the fight-flight system and the physiological mechanisms that are basic to survival, also affecting cognitive processes, such as information processing, memory, perception, attention, judgement, and decision-making, as well as physical aspects, such as endurance, strength, and flexibility [1,[3][4][5][6]. The continuous exposure to the combat stressors of military populations and air force crews have been previously related with mental disorders, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) [7], highlighting the importance of personalized training based on a better understanding of the psychological and physiological responses involved in stress coping mechanisms.…”

“…Military air operations are considered some of the most stressful events in the military, but most previous aircrew research in this area has been carried out on special tactical groups, such as paratroopers, showing how the exposure to these extreme environments and types of jumps produced a decrease in cortical arousal and an increase in the physiological stress response, mediated by the autonomous sympathetic system [8][9][10][11]. In particular, aircrews are susceptible to suffering a large variety of critical situations, since they are exposed to stressors such as hypoxia, disorientation, G forces, accidents, or air attacks during their interventions, and have to face different demands, such as different types of parachute jumps, nocturnal jumps, ground training in war zones, and different types of flights at different heights-HALO (high altitude low opening) and HAHO (high altitude high opening)-as well as underwater training in case of aircraft accidents between others [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18].…”

“…This system allows one to evaluate subjects' hamstring flexibility, and the sliding ruler centered above the box was used to obtain the flexibility scores before and after the maneuver [14]. [6]. For the database, we collected all the attempts and used the mean of the five results for the statistical analysis.…”

Impact of Weekly Physical Activity on Stress Response: An Experimental Study

“…Two of these measures, which focus the methodological attention of this research due to its great potential in the study of this topic, are the Critical Flicker Fusion Threshold (CFFT), evaluated using one Flicker Fusion instrument ( Vicente-Rodríguez et al, 2020 ), and the DC Potential, evaluated using the OmegaWave technology. The neuro-physiological basis of flicker perception is complex but well established ( Görtelmeyer and Zimmermann, 1982 ).…”