PROJECT REPORT  
FOR  
OVERLOAD VS UNDERLOAD 
 
 
SUBMITTED TOWARDS THE FULFILMENT OF THE 
CREDITS FOR THE COURSE ​PHYSIOLOGICAL 
COMPUTING ​DURING WINTER SEMESTER 2018-19 
 

Vishal Khanna 
120333 
 

 
 
 

Bauhaus University, Weimar 

Overload vs Underload 
Vishal Khanna, 120333 

INTRODUCTION 
Cognitive load/workload is defined as the extent of the cognitive demands placed on an 
individual with respect to their cognitive capacity​[1]​. A task which involves a higher level of 
cognition with respect to another task is said to have a higher cognition load. For instance, 
playing chess has a higher cognitive load than reciting the alphabets. A higher cognitive load 
also correlates with an increased tendency to make errors or fail at a given task. An individual is 
more likely to make an erroneous move in the game of Chess than they are to recite the 
alphabets incorrectly. Moreover, performing both these tasks simultaneously is more likely to 
lead to errors in one or both of them. 

The extent of the cognitive load can be reliably determined by one or more physiological 
characteristics such as: 

● Skin Conductance Response 

● Changes in the size of the pupil 

Simon effect refers to the psychological finding where a subject’s reaction time is faster if the 
stimulus occurs in the same relative direction as the response​[2]​. For our experiment, we explore 
Simon effect in the context of a dual task scenario. The subjects react to arrow markers displayed 
on a screen while performing another task, of varying difficulties, in parallel. The changes in pupil 
diameter are measured using eye trackers as an indication of the subjects’ cognitive load. This is 
done in an attempt to determine the correlation in the deterioration in task performance when 
one is assigned an additional task. This experiment attempts questions relevant to several 
real-life scenarios, such as - is it acceptable to converse with fellow passengers while driving a 
vehicle?  

METHODS 

PARTICIPANTS 
The participants for the experiment comprised of 1 subject aged 23. The participant was a 
right-handed male with no history of any neurological condition. Since the sample space for the 
 
 

experiment consists of only 1 male participant, the gender ratio(male : female) was 1 : 0 and the 
mean age was 23 with 0 standard deviation.   

PROCEDURE AND APPARATUS 

The experiment took place in a closed, well illuminated room with minimal disturbances to the 
subjects during the course of the trial. The experimental apparatus consisted of 2 Desktop PCs- 
one to display the instructions and the tasks to the subjects and another one which comprised of 
the eye tracker setup to measure the subject’s pupil dilations. The subject sat at close distance to 
the monitor and used the keyboard placed ahead of him, using his right hand, during the 
experiment.  

DESIGN 
The experiment consisted of 2 tasks. Task 1 was the Simon-test where arrows directed left or 
right were displayed on the monitor and the subject had to press the correct arrow key on the 
keyboard. In addition, the arrows appeared to the left or right of a fixation cross on the screen 
and the subject had to press the correct key as fast as possible.  

Task 2 involved inducing mental load of varying degrees to the subject. It comprised of one of 
the following tasks: 

A. Do Nothing 
B. Counting- ​Count silently upwards from 1 
C. Calculation- ​Silently add up 7   

The experimental procedure comprised of 3 phases, each lasting a minute. In each phase the 
subject has to perform task 1 and one kind of task 2 in parallel. 40 instances of an arrow 
appearing on the screen constituted 1 phase. This lead to 3 distinct experimental conditions. The 
order of each of the tasks was balanced on the basis of the latin square. The subject was also 
given an overview of the various tasks involved in each phase of the experiment beforehand. 
After the end of each phase, the subject had to rate the level of mental effort on a seven-level 
scale. The subject’s pupil dilations were recorded throughout each phase.  

ANALYSIS 
For each of the three phases(Do Nothing, Easy Task and Hard Task), we recorded the response 
time and the correctness of the subject’s input with the actual direction of the arrow. Alongside, 
we also recorded the pupil size of the subject throughout the three phases. 

Based on the recorded data, we computed the average response time across the 40 instances 
corresponding to each phase and the response accuracy percentage as a measure of the 
 
 

subject’s responses’ correction across each phase. We also averaged the pupil diameter across 
the 40 instances for each phase as a measure of the cognitive load experienced by the subject 
during the phase.  

RESULTS 
Across the three phases, we observed an increased response time and a decreased response 
accuracy with increased difficulty in the secondary task. The response time increased slightly 
from 0.67 seconds in the Do Nothing phase to 0.74 seconds in the Counting phase and much 
more significantly, to 1.17 seconds, in the Difficult task phase. In a similar manner, the response 
accuracy dropped slightly from 100% in the Do Nothing phase to 97.5% in the Easy Task phase 
and to 82.5% in the Calculation task phase.   

Phase  Average Response Time (s)  Response Accuracy (%) 

1A (Do Nothing)  0.67996  100 

1B (Count; Easy Task)  0.74250  97.5 

1C (Calculate; Hard Task)  1.17449  82.5 

Figure 1: Average Response Time and Response Accuracy for the 3 phases 

Along similar lines, we observed an increase in the average pupil dilation from 5.18 in the Do 
Nothing phase to 5.243 in the Easy Task phase. Finally, the average pupil dilation peaked during 
the Hard Task phase to 5.465. 

Figure 2: Average Pupil Dilation for the 3 phases 

 
 

DISCUSSION 
We observed that not only did the performance parameters drop with an addition of a secondary 
task, but the drop was more significant as the secondary task became increasingly complex. This 
drop in performance was observed in both the performance parameters- average response time 
and response accuracy. Hence, the observations support the hypothesis that an additional of a 
parallel task is associated with a deterioration in the task’s performance. This deterioration is 
further aggravated with an increased complexity of the secondary task.  

The data with regards to the pupil dilations also behaves similarly and confirms the correlation 
between the cognitive load with the introduction of and increase in the complexity of a secondary 
task. 

CITATIONS 
[1] Wickens, C.D. 2002. Multiple Resources and Performance Prediction. Theoretical Issues in 
Ergonomics Sci., 3(2):159-177. 

[2] ​Simon effect, Wikipedia