A Systematic Literature Review: Cognitive Workload Assessment in Human Factors Research

Cognitive workload, the mental effort it takes to complete a task, is an ever‐growing field, especially with increasing developments in technology and systems. This paper reviews published articles on cognitive workload, multitasking, the multiattribute task battery, physiological measurements of cognitive workload, and the improved performance research integration tool before gathering quantitative data about the cognitive workload field through a bibliometric analysis. The literature review was conducted to gain a deeper understanding of the cognitive workload field and synthesize published literature within the field. The bibliometric analysis was conducted using Web of Science and four VOSviewer trials to provide quantitative evidence and create predictions about the cognitive workload field. The reviews conducted in this paper lead to the findings that physiological measures of cognitive workload, specifically electroencephalography, virtual reality, and machine learning, are rising within the human factors field. This review also found that the improved performance research integration tool, a powerful tool used to model and predict workload levels, is less prevalent in recent research. Recommendations for future cognitive workload studies are also highlighted in this review.