Abstract

The safety of the main control room in a nuclear power plant is an important research topic with practical implications. In this study, we used virtual reality technology and multimodal data to investigate the effect of experience on operators’ responses under emergency conditions. We asked participants to perform a series of tasks in a virtual fire emergency environment while simultaneously recording their behavioral, eye-tracking, and physiological data. The results showed a significant effect of experience on participants’ behavioral performance, total fixation time, and skin electrical response. Participants from a high-experience group showed a longer total fixation duration and lower skin conductance level compared to those from a low-experience group. This suggested that experience could have an impact on operators’ visual information extraction and mental stress under emergency situations in an NPP. Our study also provides a reference method for using virtual experimental settings and objective measurements for future human factor research in the main control room of an NPP.

摘要

核电厂主控制室的安全性是一个重要的研究课题，具有实际意义。在这项研究中，我们使用虚拟现实技术和多模式数据来研究经验对紧急情况下操作员响应的影响。我们要求参与者在虚拟的紧急火灾环境中执行一系列任务，同时记录他们的行为，眼动和生理数据。结果显示，经验对参与者的行为表现，总固定时间和皮肤电反应有显着影响。高经验组的参与者与低经验组的参与者相比，总固定时间更长，皮肤电导水平更低。这表明在NPP紧急情况下，经验可能会影响操作员的视觉信息提取和精神压力。我们的研究还提供了一种参考方法，可用于在NPP主控制室中使用虚拟实验设置和客观测量来进行未来的人为因素研究。