The impact of mental workload levels on physiological and subjective responses

Advances in technology and the use of complex systems at work imposed high mental work load to operators, so continuous monitoring of mental workload can help to prevent mental problems and maintain mental health. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the impact of mental work load on physiological and subjective responses.
This cross-sectional descriptive-analytic study was performed on 16 healthy university students in 1393 at laboratory setting. Physiological parameters: surface electromyography and electrocardiography in six blocks (resting, high mental work, moderate, low, very low and recovery) were measured using NeXus-4. After performing each block the NASA-TLX questionnaire was completed. The statistical analysis was conducted using SPSS software, version 21.0. A 5% significance level was adopted in all tests.
The results of t-test showed a significant difference for the average score of NASA-TLX between the different levels of mental work load (P different levels of mental work load, can impact on people's subjective responses and some physiological responses. Thus, in such workplaces, may be it was necessary to conduct an ergonomic program to manage mental health.