Exposure to construction noise was associated with both physical and psychological health effects, of which mental fatigue was an important inducement. However, how construction noise affects individuals’ mental fatigue is still unclear. To address the gap, this study aimed to investigate the influences of exposure intensity and time to construction noise on mental fatigue.
The event-related potential (ERP) experiment method was adopted, involving 12 participants who were recruited to perform a 60-minute two-back cognitive task across three distinct noise levels – quiet (30 dBA), moderate (65 dBA) and high (85 dBA).
This paper found that the amplitude of negative potential wave 1 (N1), positive potential wave 2 (P2) and positive potential wave 3 (P3) decreased, while the negative potential wave 2 (N2) increased after the 60-minute 2-back cognitive task that induced mental fatigue. In addition, individuals had lowest mental fatigue under moderate noise condition compared to quiet and high noise conditions, which were supported by subjective report, behavioral data and the ERP components. Furthermore, the accuracy (ACC) of task performance increased first and then decreased with the increase of noise exposure duration under the three noise conditions.
This study contributes to, theoretically, the knowledge about the influences of construction noise intensity and exposure duration on mental fatigue. Practically, it helps to form effective prevention strategies of noise effect and mental fatigue.
This study explored the neuropsychological mechanisms behind the effects of construction noise intensity and exposure time by adopting ERP experiment.
