A novel methodology to evaluate the psycho-physical condition of individuals performing at-risk activities

Currently the evaluation of the psycho-physical condition of individuals performing at-risk activities involves either subjective evaluations or invasive biological tests, and is not often indicative of the actual ability of the subject to perform the specific activity. We propose a new methodology based on posturographic and reaction time measurements, derived from the strict relationship between the control strategies used to maintain the erect posture and the psycho-physical abilities of an individual. These strategies are affected by fatigue, diseases and substances such as alcohol and drugs. The measuring device consists of a posturographic platform, a hand-held trigger and a personal computer running the software. The subject is asked to perform simultaneously two tasks: move the center of mass of the body to follow a target on the screen, and react to the appearance of another stimulus by pressing the trigger. The task is made more complicated by randomly presenting the stimuli and by the presence of “dummy” targets the subject is supposed to ignore. Evaluating how accurately the subject follows the target, the reaction times, as well as the number of reactions to “dummy” targets allows to quantify the psycho-physical condition of the individual. This methodology could be used as a real time, fast and quantitative measure to improve road and workplace safety, not invading the privacy of the subject, easily relating to real-world activities, and not requiring highly trained personnel to administer the test.