Stress, fatigue, and mental workload exert a significant influence on the quality of operator performance. While these measures can be assessed using subjective questionnaires, these can be vulnerable to bias. Heart rate variability (HRV) is a non-invasive and relatively inexpensive means of collecting objective physiological data on the stress, fatigue, and mental workload. This presentation provides a brief primer on HRV and how it can be used to assess operator performance. Presentation details: 3rd Workshop training and assessment: Need for a paradigm shift, 4th May, 2016. University College of Southeast Norway, Campus Vestfold, Norway.

1. Using heart rate
variability to assess
performance
Daniel S. Quintana, PhD
Norwegian Center for Mental Disorders Research
University of Oslo

2. Stress, fatigue, and mental
workload exert a significant
influence on the quality of
operator performance.
Hancock & Desmond (2001)

3. Stress, fatigue, and mental
workload can be measured by
subjective measures or
physiology.

4. Measuring physiology to assess operator
performance
• EEG and fMRI can be used to assess performance
• But they’re expensive and impractical for real-world assessment

5. Mental effort and stress are
related to changes in
cardiovascular state

6. The autonomic nervous
system regulates involuntary
actions in the body

8. Electrical stimulation of the
vagus nerve modulates
changes in HRV

10. PNS SNS
65BPM

11. PNS SNS
50BPM

12. PNS SNS
150BPM

13. PNS SNS
120BPM

14. Reduced heart
rate
Increased
heart rate
Resting HR
Parasympathetic blockade
Double blockade (intrinsic HR)
Sympathetic
blockade
120BPM
150BPM
65 BPM
50BPM

15. The PNS is applying
a brake on the heart

16. Less PNS input
increases heart rate

17. Heart rate variability studies are increasing in popularity

18. Mental illness is associated
with reduced HRV at rest
Kemp & Quintana (2013) International Journal of Psychophysiology, 89

21. HRV predicts the
outcome of
cardiovascular
illness independent
of other CVD
predictors
Stein and Kleiger (1999) Annual Review of Medicine, 50(1)

22. HRV provides
information on operator
preparedness before a
task and the amount of
mental workload
investment during a
task.

23. Duschek et al. (2000) Biological Psychology, 81(2)
Heart rate variability and operator performance
• HRV decreases with more attentional processing
• Higher levels of baseline HRV related to larger declines
• Better performance related to lower HRV
• Greater attentional capacity related to reduced HRV

24. De Rivencourt et al. (2008) Ergonomics, 59(9)
Heart rate variability can measure operator task demand

25. HRV and operator performance
Pre-task During task
Task begin
HRV
Ideal operator
Less-than optimal operator

26. Measuring physiology to assess operator
performance
$100,000 USD
$2,000,000 USD in
addition to $1000
USD cost per use

27. Devices to
collect HRV
cost
between
$400 and
$20,000
USD

28. Heart rate variability is easy
to implement in simulator or
real-world environments

29. HRV can be used to ask,
“What’s the level of mental
workload investment during a
task?”

30. Easy to set-up data
collection – people
forget they’re
wearing the devices

31. “Tweetable” take home
messages
Heart rate variability (HRV) provides a non-invasive
measure of autonomic nervous system function
HRV yields objective info on operator preparedness and
the amount of mental workload investment
HRV can be unobtrusively collected in real-world
situations

32. Questions?
• Email: daniel.quintana@medisin.uio.no
• Twitter: @dsquintana