The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reported that the number of bicyclist fatalities has increased by more than 35% since 2010. One of the main reasons associated with cyclists' crashes is the adverse effect of high cognitive load due to distractions. However, very limited studies have evaluated the impact of secondary tasks on cognitive distraction during cycling. This study leverages an Immersive Virtual Environment (IVE) simulation environment to explore the effect of secondary tasks on cyclists' cognitive distraction through evaluating their behavioral and physiological responses. Specifically, by recruiting 75 participants, this study explores the effect of listening to music versus talking on the phone as a standardized secondary tasks on participants' behavior (i.e., speed, lane position, input power, head movement) as well as, physiological responses including participants' heart rate variability and skin conductance metrics. Our results show that (1) listening to high-tempo music can lead to a significantly higher speed, a lower standard deviation of speed, and higher input power. Additionally, the trend is more significant for cyclists who had a strong habit of daily music listening (> 4 hours/day). In the high cognitive workload situation (simulated hands-free phone talking), cyclists had a lower speed with less input power and less head movement variation. Our results indicate that participants' HRV (HF, pnni-50) and EDA features (numbers of SCR peaks) are sensitive to cyclists' cognitive load changes in the IVE simulator.

翻译：美国国家公路交通安全管理局报告称，自2010年以来，自行车骑行者死亡人数增加了35%以上。与骑行者事故相关的主要原因之一是分心导致的高认知负荷带来的不利影响。然而，关于次任务对骑行中认知分心影响的研究非常有限。本研究利用沉浸式虚拟环境（IVE）模拟环境，通过评估骑行者的行为和生理反应，探索次任务对骑行者认知分心的影响。具体而言，通过招募75名参与者，本研究探讨了听音乐与打电话作为标准化次任务对参与者行为（即速度、车道位置、输入功率、头部运动）以及生理反应（包括心率变异性指标和皮肤电导指标）的影响。我们的结果表明：（1）听快节奏音乐可导致显著更高的速度、更低的速度标准差以及更高的输入功率。此外，对于有强烈日常听音乐习惯（>4小时/天）的骑行者，这一趋势更为显著。在高认知负荷情境（模拟免提电话交谈）下，骑行者速度较低，输入功率较小，头部运动变化较少。我们的研究结果表明，参与者的HRV（高频、pnn-i50）和EDA特征（皮肤电导反应峰值数量）对IVE模拟器中骑行者的认知负荷变化敏感。