Validation in Industrial Workers context (Brain Products GmbH, Gilching, Germany) 

Reflective of the industrial context, a soldering task was selected, in which the operator needs to maintain a certain degree of concentration.
Different studies confirm that users resume a task more easily when they are interrupted at low-workload moments in contrast to high-workload moments. Influence of the interruption (i.e., complexity, timing, duration) on task performance, very often implies a higher probability of making errors in the task. Introducing a short wait after the intervention occurs has shown to decrease this likelihood. Since the intervention is likely to increase stress (i.e., acting in effect as a stressor according to the literature), it is foreseen that reducing stress level back to an acceptable level prior to resuming the main activity again can be effective (i.e., reduce errors/increase performance).
Therefore, Neurometric-informed interventions have several foreseen advantages on workers’ performance, stress levels, and satisfaction.
Therefore, this validation test has been was designed to assess whether an operator that is performing her/his task, could benefit from the Mindtooth solution as a means to control (go or no go) the possibility to interrupt with her/his activity. In this context, the Mindtooth system was used to optimize both the timing of interventions during working activity (i.e., with the main soldering task), and the timing of post-intervention waits prior to resuming back to the soldering task.
With the Mindtooth system it has been possible to assess both the mental workload and the stress levels in real time during the soldering task that was interrupted at certain points by a secondary task.
A specific android app was developed by IBM, to orchestrate the interventions during the simulated working activity, by tracking real time neurometrics for workload and stress by subscribing to the Mindtooth system services.
Four experimental conditions were altered:
- DISRUPTIVE
o YES: the mindtooth system triggers an intervention when measured workload is HIGH.
o NO: the mindtooth system triggers an intervention when measured workload is LOW.
- STRESS EVALUATION
o ON: the mindtooth system triggers the resumption to the main soldering task when stress is low
o OFF: resumption is triggered, after a random wait between 0 and 2 minutes.