Mental workload of young drivers during curve negotiation

An experiment was conducted in a fixed-base driving simulator to observe young drivers´ their physiology changes under high mental workload, while responding to two sets of mental tasks: n-back and sound counting. 20 drivers 9 of them younger than 25 (range 21-24) and 11 older than 25 (range 29-33) were instructed to drive along two sections on a highway at a constant speed. NASA-TLX scores for workload suggest an overall higher level of workload for the young drivers. For all participants, there were significant changes in heart rate when driving under high workload, compared to the single task of driving. Especially, it is significantly higher during curve negotiation. This effect was again more significant for young driver.