The effects of multiple firefighting activities on information processing and work performance in a smoke-diving room: An intervention study

Firefighters perform various tasks during firefighting operations under unknown and unpredictable conditions. The present study investigated the impact of firefighting activities and cooling tactics on information processing and work performance. Firefighters performed typical firefighting tasks in the four experimental conditions, namely i) no cooling device (NC), ii) cooling gel (CG), iii) cool vest (CV), and iv) cooling gel and cool vest (CG + CV). The measurement of information processing, Paced Auditory Serial Addition Test (PASAT) scores decreased significantly after the firefighting activities in the four conditions, relative to baseline. The results revealed no significant difference in PASAT scores among the four conditions. However, the performance time (PT) was significantly shorter for the CV and CG + CV compared to the NC and CG conditions. The findings confirmed that the firefighting activities have a detrimental effect on information processing. The CG + CV and CV were more effective than CG and NC in improving PT during firefighting. However, the cooling strategies have a negligible effect on improving information processing performance.