Stephen Guastello

Marquette University · Department of Psychology

The articles in this special issue examine the contributions of Jeffrey A. Goldstein to the understanding of emergence as a formal group of processes. Applications include work teams, organizations, ecologies of organizations, and societies. Prominent methodologies include agent-based modeling, qualitative analysis of publicly available business an...

This textbook comprehensively covers the basic principles and most recent advances regarding visual displays, auditory and tactile displays, and controls; psychophysics; cognitive processes; human–computer interaction, artificial intelligence and artificial life; stress and human performance; occupational accidents and prevention; human group dynam...

Objectives: This article introduces a nonlinear dynamical systems model to quantify synchronization among group members with regard to physiological activity or overt behaviors. Method: The driver-empath model accommodates asymmetries in influence among group members, separates autocorrelation effects from synchronization with other group members i...

Approach-avoidance conflicts were one of the earliest applications of catastrophe theory. Empirical studies evaluating the cusp catastrophe model for approach-avoidance dynamics have only started to appear recently, however. The present study reviews the extant research and expands the concept to approach and avoidance coping styles. Research parti...

Objective: This study evaluated the causal relationships among situation awareness (SA), cohesion, and autonomic synchrony (SE) within teams. SA is often a team effort and should be more accurate in better-functioning teams. Background: Cohesive teams perform better overall, although the relationship appears reciprocal; the relationship to SA ha...

Objective The purpose of this study was to identify self‐organised dynamics in sessions with dialogical patterns (i.e. reflective interactions of self‐states associated with psychological change) within long‐term psychotherapy. One of the hallmarks of self‐organisation is the presence of an Inverse Power Law (IPL) in the frequency distribution of r...

This chapter recounts the principal uses of the construct of chaos in psychology; these are entwined with other nonlinear dynamical constructs, especially catastrophes and self-organization. Chaos theory and research is primarily concerned with seeing the consequences of nonlinearity accurately and finding patterns in dynamics. The growth in substa...

To further the understanding of how to build or reduce synchrony in a work team, we examined two principles for defining the optimal condition to produce or limit synchrony: (a) the empath-driver ratio (relative strength of the stronger influencer compared to the receptive strength of any member in the group), and (b) the balance between autocorrel...

People often live and work in chaotic environments, and thus need to forecast and control what will happen next. The management of chaos is an apparently rare skill, and it would be valuable to identify and develop this skill in the workforce. Untrained undergraduates (N = 147) forecasted number series from four chaotic attractors of varying levels...

Synchronization is a special case of self-organization in which one can observe close mimicry in behavior of the system components. Synchrony in body movements, autonomic arousal, and EEG activity among human individuals has attracted considerable attention for their possible roles in social interaction. This article is specifically concerned with...

Chaos is a mathematical phenomenon in which seemingly random events are actually predictable by simple deterministic equations. Chaos has been identified in numerous situations requiring humans’ situation awareness, sense-making, and control. The management of chaos could be a rare skill, however, and the heuristics for doing so are not well unders...

Synchronization of autonomic arousal levels within dyads and larger teams has been associated with several types of social-behavioral outcome. One previous study reported greater physiological influence (brain activity in one area of the parietal lobe associated with verbal activity) of leaders on followers than of followers on leaders; influence w...

Many real-world tasks require people to forecast chaotic events in order to take adaptive action. This ability is considered rare, and less understood than other cognitive processes. The present study examined how the performance dynamics in a chaotic forecasting task would be affected by stressors such as cognitive workload and fatigue using two c...

Autonomic synchrony, sometimes known as physiological compliance or concordance, is a special case of self-organization that involves a high degree of correlation in the physiological time series of two or more people working together. This study investigated the role of cooperation and competition dynamics on the total amount of synchrony for 11 p...

Psychologists have had a long-standing interest in the connections between group processes and team performance. The biopsychosocial perspective has piqued an interest in the connection between team processes and performance and coordinated and synchronized physiological arousal levels among team members. Studies of synchronization in work teams ha...

The last few years have seen resurgence in interest within human factors/ergonomics (HFE) in cybernetics. HFE has a long association with cybernetics (e.g., the influence of signal detection and control theory on studies of vigilance, visual search and human-machine systems). The panel will discuss more recent applications of cybernetics and focus...

Human dyads and larger teams tend to acquire synchronized movements and autonomic arousal levels while working together or simply socializing. The synchronization of arousal patterns is of theoretical interest for group dynamics because they may add predictive value to the dynamics of group cohesion and team performance. This study examined the fou...

Although positions of greater responsibility imply greater workloads and consequences for actions, the experience of emergent leaders might be different. People who gravitate toward leadership roles might have a better understanding and skill set for the task requirements, and thus report lower workload. However, they might also report greater work...

Time series analysis, nonlinear or otherwise, requires an appropriate lag length between observations. The choice of lag length is contingent to some extent on whether the source data are under- or over-sampled. For neuro-cognitive data, the time granularity should represent psychologically meaningful units. Automatic methods for determining optima...

The use of two cusp catastrophe models has been effective for untangling the effects of cognitive workload, fatigue, and other complications on the performance of individuals. This study is the first to use the two models to separate workload and fatigue effects on team performance. In an experiment involving an emergency response simulation, 360 u...

The synchronization of autonomic arousal levels within dyads and larger teams has become a potentially important variable in the explanation of team performance and group processes. Synchronization research with groups of three or more members has been challenging because of limited means for quantifying relationships that are more extensive than d...

Understanding the relationship between human personality and preferences for pet species is important for bettering human-animal relationships, supporting animal welfare, and supporting pet therapy. The present study examined personality differences between dog people and cat people with the objective of addressing some discrepancies in previous re...

Work teams experience workload from the group dynamics in addition to the usual sources of individual workload. This study had three objectives: to assess the responsiveness of new rating scales for group workload (GWL), investigate their component structure, and determine if changes in workload occur as the team matures. Participants (360 individu...

This study investigated the stationarity of electrodermal time series collected in situations where turn taking in human interactions are involved. In this context, the stationarity of the time series is the extent to which a simple model can be used to fit the entire time series. The experiment involved seven participants in an emergency response...

Differences in workload inherent in a task have indirect and nonlinear relationships to performance differences because of coping strategies that people can deploy. Thus subjective ratings of workload have become commonplace for evaluating task workload. It has become apparent, however, that those ratings are affected by individual differences in p...

This study examined relationships between participation and performance within a team and performance transfer effects between opponents in an Emergency Response (ER) simulation. Classical organizational theories have emphasized the importance of group participation for organizational performance, but there have been few or no attempts to investiga...

Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) is characterized by obsessions, defined as intrusive and persistent thoughts, and compulsions, defined as repetitive ritualistic behaviors that attempt to neutralize the anxiety associated with the obsessions. The present study investigated the patterns of symptoms as they occur over time in order to generate new...

This chapter addresses a problem that is salient in the human factors and ergonomics communities regarding the inconsistent connections between subjective ratings of workload and actual performance. Previous work with vigilance tasks showed that a substantial part of subjective workload, and further connections to actual performance, were associate...

The study presented in this chapter examined the relationship between performance variability and actual performance of financial decision makers who were working under experimental conditions of increasing workload and fatigue. The rescaled range statistic, also known as the Hurst exponent (H) was used as an index of variability. Although H is def...

This chapter summarizes what has been learned about the dynamics of cognitive workload and fatigue and the extensions of the two cusp models to financial decision making in which an element of risk is involved. Other interesting findings concerning individual differences in response to cognitive workload and fatigue and the performance-variability...

This study presented in this chapter extends the analyses and results from the previous chapter to the risk-taking aspect of the performance time series. Although the rescaled range statistic, H, is defined as having a range between 0 and 1, 24 % of the 172 time series were negative. Results confirmed that negative H was possible and not a result o...

Body movements, autonomic arousal, and electroencephalograms (EEGs) of group members are often coordinated or synchronized with those of other group members. Linear and nonlinear measures of synchronization have been developed for pairs of individuals, but little work has been done on measures of synchronization for groups. We define a new synchron...

The effects of workload, fatigue, and practice on the performance of cognitive tasks are often intertwined. Previous research has shown that these influences can be separated with the two cusp catastrophe models. This study expanded an earlier investigation of the two models for workload and fatigue in a vigilance task to include a wider range of b...

Research on resilience in the workplace is currently limited by at least two issues: an inconsistent documentation and choice of the stress-producing events and a singular construct of what constitutes resilience (Britt, Shen, Sinclair, Grossman, & Klieger, 2016). This commentary summarizes some recent experimental research that was possibly too ne...

Nonlinear dynamical systems (NDS) theory offers new constructs, methods and explanations for phenomena that have in turn produced new paradigms of thinking within several disciplines of the behavioural sciences. This article explores the recent developments of NDS as a paradigm in ergonomics. The exposition includes its basic axioms, the primary co...

Behavioral and physiological synchronization have important implications for work teams with regard to workload management, coordinated behavior and overall functioning. This study extended previous work on the nonlinear statistical structure of GSR series in dyads to larger teams and included subjective ratings of workload and contributions to pro...

The synchronization of autonomic arousal levels and other physiological responses between people is a potentially important component of work team performance, client-therapist relationships, and other types of human interaction. This study addressed several problems: What statistical models are viable for identijiing synchronization for loosely co...

This chapter traces the parallel development of the constructs of bounded rationality in economics and cognitive capacity in psychology. Both perspectives led to the study of cognitive biases, the interdisciplinary field of behavioral economics, and artificial intelligence products that solved some of the original problems but created new and simil...

This chapter presents the elementary concepts of stress and then focuses to the more specific issues of cognitive workload and fatigue and their role in the nonlinear dynamical systems theory that is the central concern for this book. The roles of working memory and individual differences in cognitive processes are outlined. The chapter culminates...

This chapter presents an empirical assessment of the cusp catastrophe models for cognitive workload and fatigue as outlined in the previous chapter. Participants were 299 undergraduates who completed a series of psychological tests and measurements, which were followed by a financial decision making task that escalated in workload. The task require...

Investment funds typically vary with regard to the emphasis that the managers place on acceptable risk and expected returns on investment. This chapter highlight a nonlinear analytic strategy, orbital decomposition (ORBDE) for identifying and extracting patterns of categorical events from time series data. The contributing constructs from symbolic...

This book presents new theory and empirical studies on the roles of cognitive workload and fatigue on repeated financial decisions. The mathematical models that are developed here utilize the cusp catastrophe function for discontinuous changes in performance and integrate objective measures of workload, subjective experiences, and individual differ...

Linville's theory of self-complexity relies of concepts of information measurement to produce its core measurement of complexity, which is in turn thought to be positively correlated with indicators of psychological well-being. Empirical research, however, has not supported this assertion as it was initially intended. Research with complex adaptive...

Physiological synchronization of autonomic arousal between people is thought to be an important component of work team dynamics, therapist-client relationships, and other interpersonal dynamics. This article examines concepts and mathematical models of synchronization that could be relevant to work teams. Before it is possible to deploy nonlinear m...

N-back tasks place a heavy load on working memory, and thus make good candidates for studying cognitive workload and fatigue (CWLF). This study extended previous work on CWLF which separated the two phenomena with two cusp catastrophe models. Participants were 113 undergraduates who completed 2-back and 3-back tasks with both auditory and visual st...

Auditory and visual stimuli presented at intervals of about 300 m sec often produce miss errors in one or the other channel, which result from a bottleneck in a neural circuit associated with executive memory. The present study examined the possibility that cross-modal interference could carry over to performance units that transpire over 3 min or...

Many styles of visual art that build on fractal imagery and chaotic dynamics in the creative process have been examined in NDPLS in recent years. This article presents a gallery of artwork turned into design that appeared in the promotional products of the Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology & Life Sciences. The gallery showcases a variety of ne...

This study investigated the roles of four psychosocial variables – anxiety, conscientiousness, emotional intelligence, and Protestant work ethic – on subjective ratings of cognitive workload as measured by the Task Load Index (TLX) and the further connections between the four variables and TLX ratings of task performance. The four variables represe...

The cusp catastrophe models for cognitive workload and fatigue and their supporting research program evolved in response to numerous difficulties encountered in previous research. The two cusp models separate the two processes, which have the same temporal dynamic structure but different contributing variables, using an integrated experimental desi...

Comments on the article by Fredrickson and Losada (see record 2005-11834-001). Fredrickson and Losada's claimed connection between positivity ratios in human interactions and the Lorenz chaotic attractor and the extensive critique thereof (Brown, Sokal, & Friedman, December 2013) lead me to offer several remarks about nonlinear dynamical systems (N...

Although system designers usually minimise the role of individual differences in operation, personality variables could explain differences in multitasking performance. A concomitant theoretical issue is whether primary or surface personality traits do a better job of predicting performance than the Five-Factor Model (FFM) or global traits. A sampl...

This study examined the relationship between performance variability and actual performance of financial decision makers who were working under experimental conditions of increasing workload and fatigue. The rescaled range statistic, also known as the Hurst exponent (H) was used as an index of variability. Although H is defined as having a range be...

Objective: This study investigated two cusp catastrophe models for cognitive workload and fatigue for a vigilance dual task, the role of emotional intelligence and frustration in the performance dynamics, and the dynamics for individuals and teams of two participants. Background: The effects of workload, fatigue, practice, and time on a specific...

This study aimed (a) to address the evidence for situational specificity in the connection between safety climate to occupational accidents, (b) to resolve similar issues between anxiety and accidents, (c) to expand and develop the concept of safety climate to include a wider range of organizational con-structs, (d) to assess a cusp catastrophe mod...

A key challenge in upper extremity neuroprosthetics is variable levels of skill and inconsistent functional recovery. We examine the feasibility and benefits of using natural neuromotor strategies through the design and development of a proof-of-concept model for a feed-forward upper extremity neuroprosthetic controller. Developed using Artificial...

The logical consistency between generativity and the authoritative parenting style led to the hypothesis that the two behavior patterns or orientations were related. Survey measurements of perceived parenting style (authoritarian, authoritative, and permissive) and generativity in 559 university students and their respective parents were compared....

Comments on the original record by Hancock (see record 2012-28202-001) regarding the problem of iatrogenically created psychological phenomena. This comment offers a solution to two of the problems that Hancock identified in his integrative review of vigilance research. First, the performance decrement over time that can set in within a half hour o...

Cognitive engineering is an interdisciplinary approach to the analysis, modeling, and design of engineered systems or workplaces in which humans and technologies jointly operate to achieve system goals. As individuals, teams, and organizations become increasingly reliant on information technology and automation, it is more important than ever for s...

Complexity science offers a new, broader paradigm emerging from the traditional biomedical model of medicine. This new paradigm will inform research and intervention, particularly for the most complex medical conditions such as type-II diabetes (DT2), heart disease, pain, and anxiety-depression spectrum (ADS) disorders. Traditional medical interven...

A dynamical disease is one in which the symptoms appear and disappear over time in a deterministic pattern that could be chaotic. By determining the dynamic structure of the temporal pattern it would be possible to gain some insight into the triggers for symptoms if not the disease process as a whole. The present study investigated whether obsessiv...

According to the minimum entropy principle, efficient cognitive performance is produced with a neurocognitive strategy that involves a minimum of degrees of freedom. Although high performance is often regarded as consistent performance as well, some variability in performance still remains which allows the person to adapt to changing goal condition...

This handbook collects and organizes contemporary cognitive engineering research, drawing on the original research of more than 60 contributing experts. Coverage of human factors, human-computer interaction, and the conceptual foundations of cognitive engineering is extensive, addressing not only cognitive engineering in broader organizations and c...

The study introduces a nonlinear paradigm that addresses several unresolved problems concerning cognitive workload and fatigue: (a) how to separate the effects of workload versus fatigue, (b) whether the upper boundaries of cognitive channel capacity are fixed or variable, and how multitasking produces a bottleneck phenomenon, (c) that prolonged ti...

People like simple explanations, even if they are wrong or misleading. The single-cause model is the simplest epidemiological logic: “If condition X exists, then Y has an elevated likelihood of occurrence.” By implication, “If X is removed, Y does not happen.” The limitations of the reasoning become apparent when research reports pile up. By the ea...

Although still true to its original focus on the person-machine interface, the field of human factors psychology (ergonomics) has expanded to include stress research, accident analysis and prevention, and nonlinear dynamical systems theory (how systems change over time), human group dynamics, and environmental psychology. Reflecting new development...

Objective: To understand neural correlates of upper extremity task performance (functional vs. non-functional) and to understand their influence on neuromotor control strategies. Design: Cross-sectional descriptive study, with repeated measures. Setting: Medical center 1.5T MRI clinical imaging facility. Participants: Neurologically intact i...

Kanter and Mirvis (1989) reported that 43% of Americans are cynical and that confidence in business and leadership has fallen from approximately 76% in the late 1960s to about 15% today. The purpose of the present study was to investigate interrelationships among cynicism, depersonalization, estrangement, work values, and basic personality traits....

Teamwork is a complex dynamic process that emerges from team member interaction. The dynamics provide a characterization of the team over time. The stability, flexibility, and resilience of team dynamics over various windows of time can change with experience, training, environmental perturbations, and technological intervention. Once patterns of t...

It has become well established in laboratory experiments that switching tasks, perhaps due to interruptions at work, incur costs in response time to complete the next task. Conditions are also known that exaggerate or lessen the switching costs. Although switching costs can contribute to fatigue, task switching can also be an adaptive response to f...

The aim of this study was to evaluate two cusp catastrophe models for cognitive workload and fatigue. They share similar cubic polynomial structures but derive from different underlying processes and contain variables that contribute to flexibility with respect to load and the ability to compensate for fatigue. Cognitive workload and fatigue both h...

We reconceptualised several problems concerning the measurement of cognitive workload – fixed versus variable limits on channel capacity, work volume versus time pressure, adaptive strategies, resources demanded by tasks when performed simultaneously, and unclear distinctions between workload and fatigue effects – as two cusp catastrophe models: bu...