Defining and Measuring Perceptual-Motor Workload in Manual Control Tasks

Abstract

“Everyone knows” when he is subjected to a high mental workload or stress in a complex manual control task such as driving a car, steering a ship, or flying an airplane. Nevertheless, there is, as yet, no accepted definition of operator workload. This is mainly due to the incommensurate dimensions of various loading tasks and the lack of any comprehensive theory or validated models.