Li, J.; Ouyang, Y.; Dai, Q. and Luo, X. (2026) Impact of age on cognitive states influencing falling from heights in high-altitude construction: Evidence from a virtual reality and electroencephalogram study. Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, 152(7): 04026101, ISSN 0733-9364
Abstract
Construction workers working at heights are prone to falls, and an older workforce exacerbates the problem. To lessen falling risks, workers at altitudes require favorable cognitive states, which may be influenced by age. Few studies have examined how age affects cognitive states associated with the risk of falls from heights from a human factor perspective. Therefore, this study investigated the effects of age differences on vigilance, mental fatigue, attention, task engagement, and height-related anxiety among construction workers involved in construction activities at heights. This study presented immersive high-altitude construction scenes through virtual reality and adopted a new research concept for analyzing electroencephalogram data. The results indicate that older workers had lower vigilance and more mental fatigue than younger workers during work at heights, but they had higher levels of attention and task engagement and less height-related anxiety than younger peers. Five cognitive states had varied effects on the risk of falls in the two age groups; mental fatigue was the most significant for older workers, and height-related anxiety was most significant for the younger workers. This research expands the body of knowledge in age-specific safety management by determining the influential mechanism of age on construction workers' cognitive states during work at heights. The research findings will be useful in developing customized safety training programs and management strategies to improve specific cognitive states of construction workers of different ages before working at heights.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | aging workforce; cognitive states; electroencephalogram; falls from heights; virtual reality |
| Index terms: | virtual reality, falls, safety training, human factor, program, evidence, construction worker, safety management, management strategy, fatigue, body of knowledge, construction activity, anxiety |
| Subjects: | practitioner, health conditions and diseases, occupational health and safety management, construction operations, knowledge management, software systems, mental health and wellbeing, health risk and incident analysis, virtual reality, evaluation and assessment methods, management |
| Topics: | Site Management, Health and Safety, Information Management, Digital Applications, Roles and Professions, Business Strategy, Research Practice |
| Descriptive scope: | 3 PCA |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here