The Role of Sleep Disorders and Stress Coping Styles in Predicting the Executive and Neurological Functions of Drivers

People's driving style is affected by neuropsychological and neurological functions, and impairment in drivers' executive and neurological functions, as human factors, plays an important role in traffic accidents. Therefore, it is necessary to identify the factors that lead to disruption of these functions. The aim of this study was to investigate the role of sleep disorders and stress coping styles in executive and neurological functions of drivers.

The research method was descriptive and correlational. The statistical population consisted of bus drivers in the terminals of Tehran in the second half of 2020, from which 250 drivers were selected by multi-stage random sampling. Data were collected by executive function tests (Wisconsin Card Sorting Test (WCST), Nback Test, Classic Stroop Test and Go/No-go Test, neurological function tests ,Neurological Evaluation Scale (NES) and Edinburgh Handedness Inventory (EHI)), Coping Inventory for Stressful Situations (CISS) and Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index (PSQI). The suitability of the proposed model was assessed by performing structural equation modeling using SPSS24 and Amos24 software.

The results showed that the proposed model with two modifications and elimination of non-significant pathways of sleep disorders and coping styles with superiority as one of the measures of neurological functions has a good fit with the data (p<0.05). Pathways of sleep disorders, emotion-centered coping styles and avoidance to executive functions were negative and significant (p<0.05), while the pathways of sleep disorders and these coping styles to neurological functions were positive and significant (p<0.01). The pathways of problem-oriented coping style to executive functions were positive and significant (p>0.05), but the pathways of this coping style to neurological functions were not significant (p>0.05).

Assessing and considering sleep disorders and the type of coping styles of drivers is necessary in order to provide solutions to improve the executive and neurological functions of drivers.