A Vessel Class Comparison of Physiological, Affective State and Psychomotor Performance Changes In Men At Sea, Wiker, Pepper, & McCauley, 11 Jul 80(0115)
A field study was conducted to compare the influence of vessel motions, characteristic to a 89' Navy experimental Small Waterplane Area Twin Hull (SWATH) vessel, a 95' Coast Guard Patrol Boat and a 378' Coast Guard High Endurance Cutter, upon motion sickness incidence and severity, physiological indices of stress, affective state and psychomotor performance in male Coast Guardsmen.
Psychomotor performance (navigation plotting, complex counting, code substitution, Spoke Test, time estimation and critical tracking), motion sickness symptomatology, urine output and specific gravity, stress hormone excretion, heart and sweat rate, and subject mood were repeatedly sampled for eight hours a day during three control days at dockside and three days at sea as the vessels steamed side-by-side in four-hour octagonal patterns about a wave measurement buoy. All vessels were instrumented with accelerometers to continuously record vertical, lateral and longitudinal accelerations within the test compartments located below decks amidships and roll, pitch and heave accelerations at the vessel centers of gravity.
No motion sickness, stress, mood deterioration, or performance task decrements were found aboard either the SWATH vessel or High Endurance Cutter. Changes found in motion sickness symptomatology severity, physiological stress, mood state and task performance aboard the Patrol Boat were examined for relationships between motion sickness severity, accelerometer records and other independent variables. Relationships found are presented and are compared with previous laboratory motion generator and field study findings. Limited recommendations are made with regard to vessel ride quality-design criteria.