On or Off Topic: Secondary Task Relevance, Visual Input, and the Vigilance Decrement

Abstract

The current study investigated the effects of secondary task relevance on measures of vigilance decrement in a Level 2 semi-autonomous driving simulation. Past research has demonstrated that over the course of a vigilance task, vigilance (or sustained attention) decreases which leads to worse performance on measures like reaction time and accuracy. This phenomenon is known as the vigilance decrement. However, the underlying cause of the vigilance decrement is under debate. Secondary tasks can not only shed light on this debate but they might also potentially help mitigate this vigilance decrement if designed and implemented properly. Therefore the current research used secondary tasks to manipulate task demand and task engagement to further investigate the cause of the vigilance decrement.