Assessing Workers Neuro-physiological Stress Responses to Augmented Reality Safety Warnings in Immersive Virtual Roadway Work Zones

TL;DR

This study develops an immersive VR framework with wearable sensors to analyze construction workers' neuro-physiological stress responses to AR safety warnings during roadway maintenance tasks, revealing how task intensity affects stress markers.

Contribution

It introduces an integrated multi-stage experimental approach combining VR, sensors, and signal processing to assess stress responses in construction workers, highlighting neural and physiological indicators of stress.

Findings

Moderate tasks increase autonomic arousal and stress markers.

EEG shows alpha suppression and beta enhancement under stress.

Heart rate and electrodermal responses effectively classify task intensity.

Abstract

This paper presents a multi-stage experimental framework that integrates immersive Virtual Reality (VR) simulations, wearable sensors, and advanced signal processing to investigate construction workers neuro-physiological stress responses to multi-sensory AR-enabled warnings. Participants performed light- and moderate-intensity roadway maintenance tasks within a high-fidelity VR roadway work zone, while key stress markers of electrodermal activity (EDA), heart rate variability (HRV), and electroencephalography (EEG) were continuously measured. Statistical analyses revealed that task intensity significantly influenced physiological and neurological stress indicators. Moderate-intensity tasks elicited greater autonomic arousal, evidenced by elevated heart rate measures (mean-HR, std-HR, max-HR) and stronger electrodermal responses, while EEG data indicated distinct stress-related alpha suppression and beta enhancement. Feature-importance analysis further identified mean EDR and short-term HR metrics as discriminative for classifying task intensity. Correlation results highlighted a temporal lag between immediate neural changes and subsequent physiological stress reactions, emphasizing the interplay between cognition and autonomic regulation during hazardous tasks.