  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.
