Twenty young subjects participated in the experiment and stayed for 48 hours in the laboratory. They drove a moving base simulator during three two-hour sessions. The first drive was between 14:00 hours and 16:00 hours after a normal 8-hour night sleep. The second session was between 4:00 hours and 6:00 hours after a reduced night of sleep (from 23:00 hours to 3:00 hours). The third drive was during the following afternoon between 14:00 hours and 16:00 hours. The visual test lasted for 12 minutes and took place before and after each driving session. The test consisted of a tachistoscopic dual task. The subject had to concentrate on a central task of detecting a variation of luminance. The peripheral task was the detection of a luminous signal occurring at various eccentricities (between 50 degrees and 80 degrees) and presented briefly to avoid head or eye movements. The results were obtained on the discrimination of light intensity in the central task, on the number of detected peripheral signals and on the reaction time for both tasks. They show that simulated driving has an effect on visual performance which varies after a partial sleep deprivation. Simulated driving seems to affect both central and peripheral vision especially in term of reaction time. (A)
Abstract