Influence of Time Pressure on Inhibitory Brain Control During Emergency Driving

Abstract

It is believed that failures of people’s reaction to emergencies occurred during driving are closely related to the inhibitory mechanism of brain’s operations. To investigate the role of this function in emergency driving, two virtual realistic driving conditions based on stop signal task were designed and time limitation was manipulated to increase the stress in one condition. Sixteen subjects with behavioral encephalography recordings were collected and analyzed. By comparing successful and unsuccessful stop trials with event-related spectral perturbation analysis, ${\delta }$ and ${\theta }$ band power increases in frontal and central areas are correlated with driving inhibitory control of the brain. Moreover, ${\beta }$ and ${\gamma }$ band power in frontal and central areas showed more increases upon stress condition. Time pressure in driving could adjust the operation of brain’s inhibition control, to benefit the people’s reactive ability upon emergency.