Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Emotional Stressor on Human Errors in Flight: A Heart Rate Variance Examination

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Engineering Psychology and Cognitive Ergonomics (HCII 2021)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 12767))

Included in the following conference series:

  • 1286 Accesses

Abstract

This study aimed to examine the effect of emotional stressor on human errors and arousal level in flight. 16 male pilot students were recruited as the participants whom were required to complete one flight scenarios with tasks in three different performance levels in low arousal (LA) and high arousal (HA) conditions (with or without emotional stressor) respectively. The photoplethysmograph physiological sensor was used to measure heart rate (HR) and heart rate variance (HRV) variables, the indicators of emotional arousal levels. The result indicated that emotional stressor can cause an increase in emotional arousal level and a decrease in human’s skill-based and rule-based errors. Besides there was a quadratic trend for low frequency normalized unit (LF(nu)) and the number of calculation deviation (NCD), a dimension of problem-based error, which provided a plausible explain for the non-significance of the decrease in problem-based errors between HA and LA condition combined with inverted U-shaped curve. These findings have potential applications in preventing human errors before they occur.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

References

  1. Civil Aviation Administration of China: China aviation safety annual report 2019: CAAC, Beijing (2020)

    Google Scholar 

  2. International Air Transport Association. Safety Report 2019. IATA, Montreal (2020)

    Google Scholar 

  3. Shappell, S.A., Wiegmann, D.A.: The human factors analysis and classification system--HFACS. FAA, Washington, DC (2000)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Norman, D.A.: Categorization of action slips. Psychol. Rev. 88(1), 1–15 (1981)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Rasmussen, J.: Skills, rules, and knowledge; signals, signs, and symbols, and other distinctions in human performance models. IEEE Trans. Syst. Man Cybern. 3, 257–266 (1983)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Reason, J.: Human Error. Cambridge University Press, London (1990)

    Google Scholar 

  7. Wiegmann, D.A., Shappell, S.A.: A Human Error Approach to Aviation Accident Analysis: The Human Factors Analysis and Classification System. Routledge , London and New York (2017)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Landman, A., Groen, E.L., Van Paassen, M.M., Bronkhorst, A.W., Mulder, M.: The influence of surprise on upset recovery performance in airline pilots. Int. J. Aerospace Psychol. 27(1–2), 2–14 (2017)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Morris, C.H., Leung, Y.K.: Pilot mental workload: how well do pilots really perform? Ergonomics 49(15), 1581–1596 (2006)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Visciola, M., Armando, A., Bagnara, S.: Communication patterns and errors in flight simulation. Reliab. Eng. Syst. Saf. 36(3), 253–259 (1992)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. Bloguţ, A.: Stressing factors in aviation. Sci. Res. Educ. Air Force-AFASES 1, 165–170 (2015)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Maymand, M.M., Shakhsian, F., Hosseiny, F.S.: The effect of stress on flight performance. World Appl. Sci. J. 19(10), 1381–1387 (2012)

    Google Scholar 

  13. Dijkhuis, R.R., Ziermans, T., van Rijn, S., Staal, W., Swaab, H.: Emotional arousal during social stress in young adults with autism: insights from heart rate, heart rate variability and self-report. J. Autism Dev. Disord. 49(6), 2524–2535 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-019-04000-5

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Zantinge, G., van Rijn, S., Stockmann, L., Swaab, H.: Physiological arousal and emotion regulation strategies in young children with autism spectrum disorders. J. Autism Dev. Disord. 47(9), 2648–2657 (2017)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  15. Wang, C.A., Baird, T., Huang, J., Coutinho, J.D., Brien, D.C., Munoz, D.P.: Arousal effects on pupil size, heart rate, and skin conductance in an emotional face task. Front. Neurol. 9(1029), 1–13 (2018)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Jerčić, P., Sennersten, C., Lindley, C.: Modeling cognitive load and physiological arousal through pupil diameter and heart rate. Multimedia Tools Appl. 79(5–6), 3145–3159 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11042-018-6518-z

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Vine, S.J., Uiga, L., Lavric, A., Moore, L.J., Tsaneva-Atanasova, K., Wilson, M.R.: Individual reactions to stress predict performance during a critical aviation incident. Anxiety Stress Coping 28(4), 467–477 (2015)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Sexton, J.B., Thomas, E.J., Helmreich, R.L.: Error, stress, and teamwork in medicine and aviation: cross sectional surveys. BMJ 320(7237), 745–749 (2000)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Hidalgo-Muñoz, A.R., Mouratille, D., Matton, N., Causse, M., Rouillard, Y., El-Yagoubi, R.: Cardiovascular correlates of emotional state, cognitive workload and time-on-task effect during a realistic flight simulation. Int. J. Psychophysiol. 128, 62–69 (2018)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Dehais, F., Behrend, J., Peysakhovich, V., Causse, M., Wickens, C.D.: Pilot flying and pilot monitoring’s aircraft state awareness during go-around execution in aviation: a behavioral and eye tracking study. Int. J. Aerospace Psychol. 27(1–2), 15–28 (2017)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Hebb, D.O.: Drives and the CNS (conceptual nervous system). Psychol. Rev. 62(4), 243–255 (1955)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Takano, K.I., Nagasaka, A., Yoshino, K.: Experiment on validity of skin resistance level as an index of arousal level. Sangyo igaku. Japanese J. Ind. Health 35(4), 257–268 (1993)

    Google Scholar 

  23. Yerkes, R.M., Dodson, J.D.: The relation of strength of stimulus to rapidity of habit-formation. Punishment: Issues Experiments 27–41 (1908)

    Google Scholar 

  24. Schaaff, K., Adam, M.T.: Measuring emotional arousal for online applications: evaluation of ultra-short term heart rate variability measures. In: 2013 Humaine Association Conference on Affective Computing and Intelligent Interaction, pp. 362–368. IEEE (2013)

    Google Scholar 

  25. Ünal, A.B., de Waard, D., Epstude, K., Steg, L.: Driving with music: effects on arousal and performance. Transport. Res. F: Traffic Psychol. Behav. 21, 52–65 (2013)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  26. Murray, N.P., Russoniello, C.: Acute physical activity on cognitive function: a heart rate variability examination. Appl. Psychophysiol. Biofeedback 37(4), 219–227 (2012)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  27. Allsop, J., Gray, R.: Flying under pressure: effects of anxiety on attention and gaze behavior in aviation. J. Appl. Res. Mem. Cogn. 3(2), 63–71 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Gray, R., Gaska, J., Winterbottom, M.: Relationship between sustained, orientated, divided, and selective attention and simulated aviation performance: training & pressure effects. J. Appl. Res. Mem. Cogn. 5(1), 34–42 (2016)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Easterbrook, J.A.: The effect of emotion on cue utilization and the organization of behavior. Psychol. Rev. 66(3), 183–201 (1959)

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgments

We appreciate the support this work received from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 32071063).

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Flight Academy, Civil Aviation University of China, Tianjin, China

    Shuo Wang, Lei Wang & Shu Li

Authors
  1. Shuo Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Lei Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Shu Li
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Coventry University, Coventry, UK

    Don Harris

  2. Cranfield University, Cranfield, UK

    Wen-Chin Li

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2021 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this paper

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this paper

Wang, S., Wang, L., Li, S. (2021). Emotional Stressor on Human Errors in Flight: A Heart Rate Variance Examination. In: Harris, D., Li, WC. (eds) Engineering Psychology and Cognitive Ergonomics. HCII 2021. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 12767. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77932-0_7

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-77932-0_7

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-77931-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-77932-0

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation