Mental Load Research Articles

Socio-labor, health, and organizational factors as predictors of perceived high mental load in healthcare personnel during the COVID-19 pandemic

Health care personnel providing direct care to COVID-19 patients may perceive high mental load. In this study, we aimed to determine the mental workload perceived by the workers during the COVID-19 pandemic and its relationship with different variables. Cross-sectional study carried out in Chile that included 411 health care professionals. The following data were collected by means of an on-line questionnaire: sociodemographic, work-related, health, and psychological mediators and perception of the organizational conditions. The Subjective Mental Workload Scale (SCAM) -a 1 to 5 rating instrument- was applied. Scores >3 indicated high perceived mental load. We determined the independent predictors of perceived high mental load. Health care workers perceived medium-high mental load, 3.69 (IQR = 3.35-4.05); 78.4% of these professionals perceived high mental load. Several variables, mainly related to the organizational conditions of their job, acted as independent predictors for high mental load: being a nurse, having been in the job <6 years, had been working in hospital care, had had symptoms of stress and inadequate sleep, having a low perception regarding access to personal protection equipment and psychological support at their work site. In the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, health care workers perceive high mental burden, mainly associated to the organizational conditions of their job.

Multitasking While Driving: Central Bottleneck or Problem State Interference?

The objective of this work was to investigate if visuospatial attention and working memory load interact at a central control resource or at a task-specific, information processing resource during driving. In previous multitasking driving experiments, interactions between different cognitive concepts (e.g., attention and working memory) have been found. These interactions have been attributed to a central bottleneck or to the so-called problem-state bottleneck, related to working memory usage. We developed two different cognitive models in the cognitive architecture ACT-R, which implement the central vs. problem-state bottleneck. The models performed a driving task, during which we varied visuospatial attention and working memory load. We evaluated the model by conducting an experiment with human participants and compared the behavioral data to the model's behavior. The problem-state-bottleneck model could account for decreased driving performance due to working memory load as well as increased visuospatial attentional demands as compared to the central-bottleneck model, which could not account for effects of increased working memory load. The interaction between working memory and visuospatial attention in our dual tasking experiment can be best characterized by a bottleneck in the working memory. The model results suggest that as working memory load becomes higher, drivers manage to perform fewer control actions, which leads to decreasing driving performance. Predictions about the effect of different mental loads can be used to quantify the contribution of each subtask allowing for precise assessments of the current overall mental load, which automated driving systems may adapt to.

Anspannung: Introduction to concept and quantification of mental strain exemplified on data taken in five countries

In Dükers action theory Anspannung , which we translated as “psychological tension” (PT), is described as a directly experienced valid indicator for the extent of mental strain. In German-speaking regions the Category Partitioning technique (CP) has proven to be a useful method for accurately quantifying the experienced PT. Outside Germany, however, the concept of PT and the CP technique for measuring it have found little resonance, as it seemed that the central terms could not be meaningfully translated into English. To challenge these language barriers, test the applicability and usefulness of the PT concept, and evaluate the CP scaling method, we used the CP technique to quantify the level of PT required by 32 imagined everyday situations. To do this we adapted descriptions of the everyday situations from the German into English, Japanese, Korean, and Mandarin Chinese, and enrolled N = 158 participants from five countries (Canada, Germany, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan). The results show a remarkable agreement between the data collected in the five cohorts. The experimental data point to the universality of the experience of mental load in culturally and linguistically diverse societies. They also point to the need to design scaling techniques so that respondents can describe their immediate sensations as they would in everyday life.

The subjective task load responses and movement characteristics associated with purposefully designed games in junior Touch players

This study sought to design five touch-specific modified games and evaluate the subjective task load responses and movement characteristics. Forty-two high-performance junior Touch players completed five modified games during a single training session. Each game was designed to increase the physical, technical, mental, frustration or temporal load. Subjective task loads were measured after each game using the NASA task load index (NASA-TLX) questionnaire. Movement characteristics were recorded using global positioning systems. Data were analysed using a one-way repeated measures analysis of variance, and the association between movement characteristics and subjective task loads were assessed using linear mixed modelling. Clear between-game differences were observed in physical, technical, mental, frustration, temporal and technical load, indicating that the load for which the game was designed to increase (e.g. physical load = physical game) was higher than all other games (ηp2 = 0.118–0.211, all P &lt; 0.001). No differences were observed across games for effort, performance, mean or total load (ηp2 = 0.004–0.030, P = 0.178–0.947). Small to large differences in the movement characteristics were observed across the five games (ηp2 = 0.057–0.577, P &lt; 0.001–0.017). The most prominent movement characteristic associated with the NASA-TLX responses was relative distance; it was positively associated with physical and temporal load ( r = 0.16–0.24, both P &lt; 0.05) and negatively associated with technical, mental and effort load ( r = −0.29 to −0.06, P &lt; 0.001–0.353). Overall, coaches and sport scientists can design games for Touch players that increase loads through the rules, intention of the game, and by altering relative distance.

Особливості психофізіологічного статусу студентів з різними типами вегетативної регуляції в умовах навантаження

The process of students’ adaptation should be considered as a dynamic and integrated process of forming the necessary skills to meet the needs that arise during study at a higher education institution. The purpose of the study was to establish the nature of psychophysiological indicators of students with different types of autonomic regulation in conditions of physical and mental activity. Materials and methods. The article presents the results of a study of the psychophysiological indicators of 128 students (65 boys and 63 girls) of the Petro Mohyla Black Sea National University aged 17-25 years. All students had psychophysiological indicators before and after mental and physical activity measured with the device for psychophysiological research «PFI-2». The students were divided into groups according to the types of vegetative regulation, according to the method of express assessment of the functional state of regulatory systems according to N. I. Shlyk. All students had indicators of heart rate variability at rest on short recordings of the cardiac signal (2 minutes), obtained with the help of the rhythm «MPFI-rhythmograph-1». Proofreading method according to the method of M. V. Krivonosov et al. (2001) was used as a mental load, which consisted of finding and selecting a specific letter in test tables for 20-25 minutes. Aerobic exercise consisted of taking a distance of 2 km on a rowing machine Concept-2 for 10 minutes. Results and discussion. The obtained results showed that after the mental load, the psychophysiological indicators of students of all groups did not change reliably, which led to the formation of adaptation mechanisms. However, only the students of group 3 have grouped reliable changes in some indicators of the correct sample, which reflects the state of development of mobilization. After physical exertion, changes in individual and typological indicators were observed in representatives of groups 1 and 3. A significant decrease in the indicators of functional mobility of nervous processes and the strength of nervous processes indicates the mobilization of the body's reserves. The value of the dynamics of nervous processes in group 1 significantly increased after physical exertion, which indicates the development of a state of fatigue. There was also a significant increase in the number of anticipated/delayed reactions in group 3, which indicates the predominance of excitation processes over inhibition. After physical exertion, no significant changes in psychodynamic parameters were observed, but in group 2, the time of the complex simple visual-motor reaction significantly increased, which indicates the development of a state of fatigue. After physical exercise, the students of group 3 have observed significant changes in the values of the correction test indicators, which indicates the mobilization of the body's reserves. Conclusion. The analysis of the results of the study made it possible to establish that the mental load had an insignificant effect on the representatives of group 3. After physical exertion, significant changes were observed in representatives of all groups, except for group 4

Automatic priming, schema induction and spread of activation in l2 lexical access: Do differences in vocabulary size and depth of priming remain invariant?

This study investigated automatic priming, schema induction, spread of activation and L2 lexical access through vocabulary size and depth. Employing theoretical framework of the distributed memory representation, the underlying assumption was that conceptual knowledge was identified through connection weights linking processing units that were universal rather than local. Using experimental pre-test-post-test design with purposive sampling of estimated one hundred and fifty (150) students from three (3) Senior High Schools, the critical findings in this study were that cognitive differences in automatic priming, schema induction and spread of activation predicted enhanced reading comprehension in L2, especially how fast one could infer from text since these cognitive processes helped to reduce cognitive load involved in reading. The second finding was that ability to use automatic priming, schema induction and spread of activation reduced mental load to facilitate comprehension by the size and level of vocabulary readers possessed in long-term memory. Third finding was that priming, spread of activation and schema induction increased with increasing attentional control. Readers with high attentional control were more likely to be involved in a proactive expectancy strategic use of priming, spread of activation and schema induction to generate possible targets. These cognitive differences remain invariant in readers, unless classroom practices are deliberately designed to help less enhanced readers strategies to promote schema induction, priming and spread of activation.

Heart Rate Variability as an Indicator of the Regulatory Mechanism Condition in Body Physiological Adaptation

Research relevance: this article deals with aspects of heart rate variability (HRV) indicators as an indicator of the state of regulatory mechanisms of physiological adaptation of the body of foreign students in the process of education. Research purpose: analysis of HRV indicators, the state of the cardiovascular system (CVS), and the pulmonary ventilation system, as indicators of the state of the regulatory mechanisms of physiological adaptation of the body of foreign students in the process of education. Research materials and methods: students at the international school of medicine (ISM) were invited to the International University of Kyrgyzstan (IUK) (from the Republic of Pakistan) for 3 years of study. Anthropometric data (body mass index (BMI), pulse and arterial pressure indicators, vital capacity of the lungs (PE) (peak flowmetry), which are indicators of the physiological state of the body; particular changes in the spectral characteristics of the heart rhythm of foreign students during mental load (measurement VSR at rest and with load); the level of load endurance CVS. Research results: the main role in changes in regulatory mechanisms belongs to the cardiorespiratory system, which is responsible for supplying organs and tissues with oxygen and nutrients. Parameters of VSR allow assessing not only the existing state of health of a person, but also his potential opportunities. Conclusions: these research results are an important aspect for the development of concepts of regulation of psychological and physical stress during the development of the curriculum of medical faculties.

Research on mental load state recognition based on combined information sources

Whether from a theoretical research perspective or a practical situation, mental loads lead to lower productivity, worse job quality, and industrial accidents, and evaluating the mental loads of workers is important for task assignment, job performance, and production safety. In this study, impact sensitivity experiments were used to induce emotions such as fear and tension in participants, thus causing them to develop mental load. Prospective time-distance estimation tests and subjective questionnaires were used to validate the induction experiment. EEG signals from three brain regions and eye movements of the subjects made up four single variables, and combinations of different brain regions and eye movements were used as combined variables. Thus, a total of 15 variables were used for the analysis of mental load states. The Relief algorithm was applied to the 15 variables for feature extraction to construct an optimized feature set. Then, 4 types of classifiers were used to identify mental load states. The combination of occipital area and eye movement variables achieved better mental load assessment results than single variables. With this combination variable, the SVM (94.9 %) and RF (94.3 %) classifiers were effective. However, the SVM classification accuracy gradually increased with the number of training sessions, while the RF classifier did not show this trend. Therefore, the SVM classifier was the best mental load classification method. The results of this study can be used to assess the mental loads of workers, reducing the number of accidents and improving productivity.

Piton: Investigating the Controllability of a Wearable Telexistence Robot.

The COVID-19 pandemic impacted collaborative activities, travel, and physical contact, increasing the demand for real-time interactions with remote environments. However, the existing remote communication solutions provide limited interactions and do not convey a high sense of presence within a remote environment. Therefore, we propose a snake-shaped wearable telexistence robot, called Piton, that can be remotely used for a variety of collaborative applications. To the best of our knowledge, Piton is the first snake-shaped wearable telexistence robot. We explain the implementation of Piton, its control architecture, and discuss how Piton can be deployed in a variety of contexts. We implemented three control methods to control Piton: HM-using a head-mounted display (HMD), HH-using an HMD and hand-held tracker, and FM-using an HMD and a foot-mounted tracker. We conducted a user study to investigate the applicability of the proposed control methods for telexistence, focusing on body ownership (Alpha IVBO), mental and physical load (NASA-TLX), motion sickness (VRSQ), and a questionnaire to measure user impressions. The results show that both the HM and HH provide relevantly high levels of body ownership, had high perceived accuracy, and were highly favored, whereas the FM control method yielded the lowest body ownership effect and was least favored. We discuss the results and highlight the advantages and shortcomings of the control methods with respect to various potential application contexts. Based on our design and evaluation of Piton, we extracted a number of insights and future research directions to deepen our investigation and realization of wearable telexistence robots.

GO-Finder: A Registration-free Wearable System for Assisting Users in Finding Lost Hand-held Objects

People spend an enormous amount of time and effort looking for lost objects. To help remind people of the location of lost objects, various computational systems that provide information on their locations have been developed. However, prior systems for assisting people in finding objects require users to register the target objects in advance. This requirement imposes a cumbersome burden on the users, and the system cannot help remind them of unexpectedly lost objects. We propose GO-Finder (“Generic Object Finder”), a registration-free wearable camera-based system for assisting people in finding an arbitrary number of objects based on two key features: automatic discovery of hand-held objects and image-based candidate selection. Given a video taken from a wearable camera, GO-Finder automatically detects and groups hand-held objects to form a visual timeline of the objects. Users can retrieve the last appearance of the object by browsing the timeline through a smartphone app. We conducted user studies to investigate how users benefit from using GO-Finder. In the first study, we asked participants to perform an object retrieval task and confirmed improved accuracy and reduced mental load in the object search task by providing clear visual cues on object locations. In the second study, the system’s usability on a longer and more realistic scenario was verified, accompanied by an additional feature of context-based candidate filtering. Participant feedback suggested the usefulness of GO-Finder also in realistic scenarios where more than one hundred objects appear.

COMPREHENSIVE ASSESSMENT OF THE HEALTH OF YOUNG PEOPLE LIVING IN THE FAR NORTH

The paper considers the creation of a diagnostic system based on morphological and biophysical indicators that allows us to understand the influence of the climatic component, as well as stress factors on the general physiological state of young people for further correction of preventive measures and preservation of the health of the peoples of the Far North. The aim of the study is a comprehensive assessment of the health of young people living in the Far North based on the results of bioluminescent saliva activity, stress-emotional state obtained before and after intense mental stress, as well as anthropometric and bioimpedance indicators. 117 students of the Medical Institute of Surgut State University took part in the survey at a young age (18-23 years) during the educational process (rest) and during the examination session (mental load) in the first half of the year of study (autumn-winter 2021). The stress-emotional state was assessed using the Spielberger-Khanin test, the functional state of students They were studied using bioluminescent salivary fluid testing, anthropometric and bioimpedance methods. Samples were obtained by spitting unstimulated saliva into a test tube.&#x0D; As a result of the study, regional features of the physique of young people were revealed, which indicates the formation of a phenotype adapted to living conditions in the northern region. The relationship between the stress-emotional status of adolescents and the level of inhibition of the bioluminescent enzymatic system by saliva samples taken before and after mental stress was shown. The value of the residual glow had an increased indicator for the state of rest and significantly reduced the intensity of the bioluminescent glow under mental stress. The methodological development obtained in the future will make it possible to effectively manage the methods and methods of diagnosing young people, taking into account the influence of external factors, climatic zones and conditions.

Can Previews Mitigate the Effect of Interruptions? Findings from a Lab Experiment under Various Workloads

Human attention has become a critical resource for the effective design of smart services in which control may move back and forth between humans and computers. To avoid errors in critical conditions when the mental load is high, computer systems need to manage ongoing interruptions. In particular, the effect of interruptions can be mitigated with previews of computer-generated notifications. While previews have been used to increase engagement, research on their potential to mitigate the effect of interruptions is scarce. Using an experiment based on a game environment with varying task loads, we investigated the effect of previews on mitigating interruptions at several levels of mental load. We found interruptions that displayed previews added less to participants’ mental load but did not improve their overall performance. These results were consistent in all levels of task load. We summarize the article by discussing how previews can be designed to minimize the negative effects of interruptions.

The influence of the order and congruency of correct and erroneous worked examples on learning and (meta-)cognitive load.

Several studies highlight the importance of the order of different instructional methods when designing learning environments. Correct but also erroneous worked examples are frequently used methods to foster students' learning performance, especially in problem-solving. However, so far no study examined how the order of these example types affects learning. While the expertise reversal effect would suggest presenting correct examples first, the productive failure approach hypothesizes the reversed order to be learning-facilitating. In addition, congruency of subsequent exemplified problems was tested as a moderator of the effect of order on learning. For example, with arithmetic tasks, congruent problems target exactly the same calculation while incongruent problems refer to different calculations. Following cascade theory, a model of cognitive skill acquisition, presenting correct examples first should be more effective when the subsequent exemplified problems are different. To test the (conflicting) hypotheses, 83 university students were assigned to one of the four conditions in a 2 (correct vs. erroneous example first) × 2 (same vs. different exemplified problems) between-subject design. Learners navigated through a slideshow on the topic of Vedic mathematics consisting of explicit instruction, worked examples differing in terms of the experimental condition, and transfer problems. Although no main or interaction effects were found regarding students' learning performance, mediational analysis offered support for the expertise reversal effect, as it indicated that there is a significant indirect effect of order via mental load on learning. Presenting correct examples first and erroneous examples second resulted in a lower mental load, which in turn was associated with better learning performance. In contrast, presenting erroneous examples first and correct examples second resulted in a more accurate self-assessment of learning performance. These findings offer first insights into the question of how the presentation order of different example types impacts learning and provide practical recommendations for the design of educational media. Results are discussed in light of the ongoing debate regarding the question if less guided instructional methods should precede or succeed more guided methods.

Impeded frontal-occipital communications during Go/Nogo tasks in humans owing to mental workload

Human brains rely on oscillatory coupling mechanisms for regulating access to prefrontal cognitive resources, dynamically communicating between the frontal and remote cortex. We worry that communications across cortical regions will be impeded when humans in extreme space environments travel with mental load work, affecting the successful completion of missions. Here, we monitored crews of workers performing a Go/Nogo task in space travel, accompanied by acquisitions of electroencephalography (EEG) signals. These data demonstrated that when the target stimulus suddenly changed to the non-target stimulus, an instantaneous communication mechanism between the frontal and occipital cortex was established by theta-gamma phase-amplitude coupling (PAC). However, this frontal-occipital communication was impeded because of the mental workload of space travel. 86 healthy volunteers who participated in the ground imitation further indicated that mental workload caused decoupled theta-gamma PAC during the Go/Nogo task, impeding frontal-occipital communications and behavioral performance. We also found that the degree of theta-gamma PAC coupling in space was significantly lower than on the ground, indicating that mental workload and other hazards worsen the impeded frontal-occipital communications of humans. These results could guide countermeasures for the inadaptability of humans working in spaceflight.

Exploring the Visual Guidance of Motor Imagery in Sustainable Brain–Computer Interfaces

Motor imagery brain–computer interface (MI-BCI) systems hold the possibility of restoring motor function and also offer the possibility of sustainable autonomous living for individuals with various motor and sensory impairments. When utilizing the MI-BCI, the user’s performance impacts the system’s overall accuracy, and concentrating on the user’s mental load enables a better evaluation of the system’s overall performance. The impacts of various levels of abstraction on visual guidance of mental training in motor imagery (MI) may be comprehended. We proposed hypotheses about the effects of visually guided abstraction on brain activity, mental load, and MI-BCI performance, then used the event-related desynchronization (ERD) value to measure the user’s brain activity, extracted the brain power spectral density (PSD) to measure the brain load, and finally classified the left- and right-handed MI through a support vector machine (SVM) classifier. The results showed that visual guidance with a low level of abstraction could help users to achieve the highest brain activity and the lowest mental load, and the highest accuracy rate of MI classification was 97.14%. The findings imply that to improve brain–computer interaction and enable those less capable to regain their mobility, visual guidance with a low level of abstraction should be employed when training brain–computer interface users. We anticipate that the results of this study will have considerable implications for human-computer interaction research in BCI.

Increase in Mental Disorders During the COVID-19 Pandemic - Role of Occupational &amp; Financial Strains

Abstract Background Numerous studies reported an increase in mental disorders during the COVID-19 pandemic, but the specific causes for this increase are unclear. We therefore investigate whether pandemic-related occupational and financial changes (e.g., reduced working hours, working from home, financial losses) were associated with increased symptoms of depression and anxiety compared with the situation before the pandemic. Methods We analyzed data from the German National Cohort Study (NAKO). Between May and November 2020, 161,849 participants answered questions on their mental state and social circumstances. Responses were compared with data from the baseline survey before the pandemic (2014-2019). Linear fixed-effects models were used to determine whether individual changes in the symptoms of depression (PHQ-9) or anxiety (GAD-7) were associated with occupational/financial changes (controlling for covariates). Results A pronounced increase in symptoms was observed among those who became unemployed during the pandemic (+ 1.16 points on the depression scale, 95% confidence interval [0.91; 1.41], range 0-27). Increases were also seen for reduced working hours without short-term working allowance, increased working hours, working from home, insecurity regarding employment, and financial strain. The deterioration in mental health was largely statistically explained by the occupational and financial changes investigated in the model. Conclusions Depressive symptoms and anxiety disorders increased in the study population during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic and occupational and financial difficulties were an essential contributory factor. These strains should be taken into account both in the care of individual patients and in the planning of targeted prevention measures. Results suggest that welfare state benefits such as short-time allowance in times of crises may reduce mental load in affected populations.

Nasa-TLX and Sofi Methods as a Tool for Measuring Students' Mental Load and Failure During Online Learning Basic Neurology Physiotherapy Courses

Online lectures are currently being implemented due to the Covid-19 Pandemic. The problem of students who are not accustomed to the demands of independent study due to limited time, facilities, materials and abilities, causes excessive anxiety and panic. This will cause a mental burden that it has an impact on student fatigue which causes a decrease in efficiency, resilience and work capacity. Therefore, this study aims to evaluate the mental workload and fatigue of students during online lectures. Measurement of mental workload using the NASA-TLX method and fatigue measurement using SOFI. The results of this study indicate that the mental workload received by students is in the high category while fatigue is in the medium category. Significant differences in average mental load can be seen based on gender, scientific field, study program accreditation, education level, GPA during online lectures, involvement of student activities, online lecture aids, online lecture venues, how to connect to the network, online tuition fees, and the number of hours of online study. Significant differences in average fatigue can be seen based on gender, study program accreditation, education level, online lecture aids, and the number of hours of online study..

ERP Study of Mine Management System Warning Interface under Fatigue.

Due to the large volume of monitoring data in mines, concentrating on and reviewing the data for a long period of time will easily cause fatigue. To study the influence of different visual codes of early-warning interfaces on the response of individuals who are fatigued, the changes in the subjective fatigue and corresponding frequency waves are compared before and after a fatigue-inducing task, as well as using event-related potential to study the behavioral data and EEG signals of subjects who participated in an oddball task on an early-warning interface. The results showed that all 14 subjects became fatigued after the fatigue-inducing task, and the amplitude of P200 when text is used in a fatigued state was the largest, with the longest latency. The subjects showed a slower reaction time and a reduced accuracy rate, thus indicating that in designing a warning interface, when text rather than color is used as a visual code, the operating load will be larger, mental load is increased, and attention resources are consumed. The experimental results provide the basis for the design and evaluation of early-warning interfaces of mine management systems.

The gendering of energy household labour

Gender considerations, such as the division of household labour and the coordination of everyday household practices, are important for the energy transition of households. Household labour involves everyday practices (e.g. cooking, laundry and caring for others) and practices of energy household labour (<em>e.g</em>. managing digital technologies and energy systems). Emerging smart energy technologies require energy flexibility and efficiency, thereby introducing new forms of household labour can have implications for the household which are not well understood. Through a literature review and some empirical insights from a European Horizon 2020 project, mental aspects of energy household labour are identified: practices of coordination and multitasking, remembering and anticipating, and powerful emotional labour which shapes the practices. Smart technologies and energy systems add more physical and mental labour to households due to the need for additional coordination and change of practices. This additional demand for coordination can exacerbate existing gender inequalities in the division of household labour: technological strategies and designs need to engage with this and reduce new burdens. Considerations for future research are proposed and a gender-sensitive framework for understanding the transition of energy household labour is outlined. <em><strong>Practice relevance</strong></em> Despite the balancing of more stereotypical gender roles in everyday life at home, the mental load of household labour still overburdens women. Technology design and strategies for its domestication need to recognise this load and adopt more gender-sensitive ways of supporting the mental aspects of household labour performed for the organisation of home and provide appropriate digital literacy opportunities for those who use them, without undermining their contribution in the process. Technology-assisted support for the mental aspects of household labour should allow for better negotiations and distribution of household labour required for a successful energy transition, without at the same time adding extra work for both men and women. The initial empirical insights call for a gender-sensitive framework for investigating the emerging practices that this involves, for the energy transition of households.

The mental load in separated families

Objective: This paper asks how evolving contact and gendered working lives, gendered identities, and conflict and parental relationships influence cognitive labour in separated families.&#x0D; Background: The fact that the often-invisible work of planning, researching, and executing decisions concerning children and household maintenance is borne by women/mothers, receives growing research attention, yet, the bulk of this research focuses on the gendered division of the mental load in intact families. Given the high prevalence of separated families with high levels of father contact, more work is needed to understand how cognitive labour is divided by parents residing in separate households.&#x0D; Method: This paper draws on 31 semi-structured interviews of separated parents, including 7 former couples. Interviews were sampled from a nationally representative longitudinal survey, Understanding Society, professionally transcribed and thematically analysed with Nvivo.&#x0D; Results: Analysing the interviews reveals both continuity and change in the division of the mental load following separation. For some families, gendered identities and working lives continue to justify an unequal division of the mental load, even when children spend large amounts of time solely with fathers. In others, conflict can reduce communication between parents, either increasing fathers cognitive labour through parallel parenting or decreasing it when fathers are excluded from decision-making altogether. Finally, separation can present a turning point where working lives and identities are re-evaluated, and the mental load can be negotiated anew.&#x0D; Conclusion: We provide new evidence that the mental load remains gendered even among those practicing a relatively "modern" family form of shared care post-separation, while highlighting possibilities for variation and change.