Fatigue and vigilance in medical experts detecting breast cancer
Menée auprès de 360 experts ayant lu au total plus d'un million de mammogrammes, cette étude examine la précision de leur analyse en fonction de l'environnement de travail
For over 70 y, researchers have believed that as time on search tasks increases, humans make more errors detecting target “events” (and take longer): a “vigilance decrement.” Previous research has been undertaken in laboratory settings, on tasks with little control over presentation rate, but generalized to real-world scenarios, leading to regulations limiting continuous viewing time in cancer screening. We demonstrate that in a large, controlled study in clinical practice, where readers self-pace reading and rest breaks, reduced accuracy is not observed. Overall accuracy increases with time on task with fewer false alarms. Instead of limiting continuous viewing time, work environments for breast screening should allow experts uninterrupted sessions of self-chosen length, thus improving accuracy and reducing unnecessary further tests.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences , article en libre accès, 2023