The effects of extended work under sleep deprivation conditions on team-based performance

Abstract

Teamwork is becoming increasingly common in today's workplaces; however, little research has examined how well teams perform under sleep deprivation conditions. The purpose of the current study was to examine the effect of extended work under sleep deprivation conditions on team performance. A total of 24 participants were sleep deprived for 30 h and completed 16 h of sustained operations during the last portion of the sleep deprivation period. The participants completed the Wombat, a complex task including vigilance and cognitive components, with a partner in four 24-min testing sessions during the sustained operations period. The results indicated that team performance increased during the work period while, within each testing session, team performance on vigilance tasks remained stable and overall performance decreased. The current results suggest that performance on two-person teams results in improved performance but does not fully counteract the decreases in performance within each work period. Performance in two-person teams increased across an extended work shift under sleep deprivation conditions. However, vigilance performance remained stable while overall performance decreased when examining performance in 8-min segments. These results suggest that averaging team-based performance over a longer testing period may mask the negative effects of sleep deprivation.

Statement of Relevance: Performance in two-person teams increased across an extended work shift under sleep deprivation conditions. However, vigilance performance remained stable while overall performance decreased when examining performance in 8-min segments. These results suggest that averaging team-based performance over a longer testing period may mask the negative effects of sleep deprivation.

Keywords:

• performance
• sleep deprivation
• sustained operations
• teamwork

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by grant #N000140210347 titled, ‘Enhancement of training and performance through man-machine interactions’ from DARPA through the Office of Naval Research. We thank Dr Eric R. Muth as the Principal Investigator on the DARPA grant. We also thank graduate and undergraduate students at Clemson University for their assistance when completing data gathering for the study and with data management including David Band, Jessica Bradley, Hailey Gillis, Heather Odle-Dusseau, Allison Rauls and Shea Tolbert.