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While driving, stress is caused by situations in which the driver estimates their ability to manage the driving demands as insufficient or loses the capability to handle the situation. This leads to increased numbers of driver mistakes and traffic violations. Additional stressing factors are time pressure, road conditions, or dislike for driving. Therefore, stress affects driver and road safety. Stress is classified into two categories depending on its duration and the effects on the body and psyche: short-term eustress and constantly present distress, which causes degenerative effects. In this work, we focus on distress. Wearable sensors are handy tools for collecting biosignals like heart rate, activity, etc. Easy installation and non-intrusive nature make them convenient for calculating stress. This study focuses on the investigation of stress and its implications. Specifically, the research conducts an analysis of stress within a select group of individuals from both Spain and Germany. The primary objective is to examine the influence of recognized psychological factors, including personality traits such as neuroticism, extroversion, psychoticism, stress and road safety. The estimation of stress levels was accomplished through the collection of physiological parameters (R-R intervals) using a Polar H10 chest strap. We observed that personality traits, such as extroversion, exhibited similar trends during relaxation, with an average heart rate 6% higher in Spain and 3% higher in Germany. However, while driving, introverts, on average, experienced more stress, with rates 4% and 1% lower than extroverts in Spain and Germany, respectively.
Globalization has increased the number of road trips and vehicles. The result has been an intensification of traffic accidents, which are becoming one of the most important causes of death worldwide. Traffic accidents are often due to human error, the probability of which increases when the cognitive ability of the driver decreases. Cognitive capacity is closely related to the driver’s mental state, as well as other external factors such as the CO2 concentration inside the vehicle. The objective of this work is to analyze how these elements affect driving. We have conducted an experiment with 50 drivers who have driven for 25 min using a driving simulator. These drivers completed a survey at the start and end of the experiment to obtain information about their mental state. In addition, during the test, their stress level was monitored using biometric sensors and the state of the environment (temperature, humidity and CO2 level) was recorded. The results of the experiment show that the initial level of stress and tiredness of the driver can have a strong impact on stress, driving behavior and fatigue produced by the driving test. Other elements such as sadness and the conditions of the interior of the vehicle also cause impaired driving and affect compliance with traffic regulations.
In previous studies, we used a method for detecting stress that was based exclusively on heart rate and ECG for differentiation between such situations as mental stress, physical activity, relaxation, and rest. As a response of the heart to these situations, we observed different behavior in the Root Mean Square of the Successive differences heartbeats (RMSSD). This study aims to analyze Virtual Reality via a virtual reality headset as an effective stressor for future works. The value of the Root Mean Square of the Successive Differences is an important marker for the parasympathetic effector on the heart and can provide information about stress. For these measurements, the RR interval was collected using a breast belt. In these studies, we can observe the Root Mean Square of the successive differences heartbeats. Additional sensors for the analysis were not used. We conducted experiments with ten subjects that had to drive a simulator for 25 minutes using monitors and 25 minutes using virtual reality headset. Before starting and after finishing each simulation, the subjects had to complete a survey in which they had to describe their mental state. The experiment results show that driving using virtual reality headset has some influence on the heart rate and RMSSD, but it does not significantly increase the stress of driving.
