Evoked Potential Amplitude as a Measure of Attention in Working Environments: A Comparative Study of Telephone Switchboard Design

Abstract

Deficits in job satisfaction and performance have been reported among operators of modern cordless telephone switchboards relative to the operation of the older cord switchboards. The attentional demands of these switchboards were investigated using, as an index of attention, the amplitude of the cortical evoked potential (CEP) to an appropriate task-relevant event. However, no reliable differences in the CEP were obtained; nor indeed were differences in alpha activity or heart rate present. Emphasis is placed upon the methodological importance of this contribution in drawing attention to the CEP as a measure of psychological processes in applied contexts.

The development of mental workload measurement in flexible manufacturing systems

“…In practice, valid methods for measuring mental workload must be used for the following four purposes: (1) allocating functions and tasks between the human and the machine, based on the predicted mental workload; (2) comparing alternative equipment and task designs in terms of the mental workload imposed; (3) supervising the operator of complex equipment to help him/her to adapt to the difficult task, and (4) choosing operators who have higher mental capacities for demanding tasks (Sanders and McCormick, 1987). Some workload measurements have been proposed, such as physiological variables (Beatty, 1982;Israel et al, 1980;Kramer, Wickens, and Donchin, 1983;Wastell, Brown, and Copeman, 1981;Wierwille, 1979;Wilson et al, 1987); secondary task methods (Ogden, Levine, and Eisner, 1979;Rolfe, 1971;Wickens, 1979Wickens, , 1980Wierwille and Casali, 1984); primary task measurements (Albanese, 1977;Linton, 1975), and subjective measurements (Cooper and Harper, 1969;Gopher and Braune, 1984;Gopher and Donchin, 1986;Hart and Staveland, 1988;Hendy, Hamilton, and Landry, 1993;Nygren, 1991;Reid, Shjingledecker, and Eggemeier, 1981;Wierwille and Casali, 1983).…”

An instrumental scientist: Ivan D. Brown (1927–2014)

“…This same ability to adapt methods of measurement in order to characterise performance in real world settings was also to the fore in Ivan's ground breaking research on the demands of telephone switchboards (e.g. Wastell, Brown, & Copeman, 1981, which used evoked potentials to assess attentional demand) and copy-typing (Hull & Brown, 1975, which contrasted the effects of visual and acoustic confusability).…”