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Multimodal EEG and Eye-Tracking Assessment of Perceived Mental Workload and Situation Awareness in a Visual Display
Mingchong Xiao1, Zhengwen Zhou2, Han Peng3
1School of Automation Science and Engineering, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510641, China.
Sensors (Basel, Switzerland)
|August 13, 2026
Summary
This study shows that EEG and eye-tracking can help assess situation awareness (SA) and mental workload in visual display terminal (VDT) tasks. Physiological measures show promise for VDT operator monitoring.
Area of Science:
- Neuroscience
- Human Factors Engineering
- Cognitive Psychology
Background:
- Visual display terminal (VDT) tasks are critical in safety-critical systems, demanding high operator situation awareness (SA) and efficient mental workload management.
- Assessing SA and workload in real-time is challenging but crucial for operator performance and safety.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the utility of electroencephalography (EEG) and eye-tracking technologies for assessing SA and perceived mental workload during VDT tasks.
- To explore the potential of physiological indicators to differentiate between varying levels of SA and workload.
- To conduct an exploratory analysis of short-term incentive effects on cognitive states.
Main Methods:
- Thirty participants performed a SATEST-based VDT simulation task.
- Collected subjective scales, behavioral performance data, EEG signals, and eye-tracking data across SA perception, comprehension, and projection stages.
- Analyzed physiological data using SART and NASA-TLX groupings, Spearman correlations, and linear regression. Incentive effects were explored as a contextual factor.
Main Results:
- Saccade-related eye-tracking metrics significantly differed between high and low SA groups (p=0.0043-0.0457).
- Fronto-central relative theta power distinguished SA levels during the perception stage (p=0.0315).
- Higher perceived workload correlated with lower SART scores, reduced SA accuracy, increased SA angular error, and lower frontal theta/alpha power (p=0.0094-0.0294).
- Exploratory incentive analysis yielded limited, unreliable cognitive-state regulation effects.
Conclusions:
- Preliminary evidence supports the use of multimodal physiological assessment (EEG and eye-tracking) for VDT tasks.
- Identified physiological measures (saccade metrics, theta power, frontal alpha/theta power) show potential as candidate indicators for SA and workload.
- Further validation is required to establish these measures for reliable cognitive-state monitoring in operational environments.
