An individualized approach to the skin conductance assessment during execution of various complexity level tasks

Researchers use different approaches to analyze changes in skin conductance. At the same time, individual differences are noted both in the initial values of skin conductance and in response to stimuli. This fact does not allow comparing the reactions of different people to the same impact. An individualized approach to the assessment of psycho-emotional stress has been developed using the real-time skin conductance index during continuous performance of a task with different levels of complexity. The study participants were 18 second-year students at the actors' high school. They performed a simple task (expressive reading aloud of a simple text) and a difficult task (expressive reading aloud of the text inverted 180°). During the task, the participants were continuously recorded skin conductance. As a result, a change in the parameters of skin conductivity was revealed depending on the complexity of the task, both in comparison with the state of rest (baseline), and when performing a simple and complex stage of the study. However, individually, the skin conduction curves of the subjects differed greatly. A method for an individualized approach to assessing psycho-emotional stress using real-time registration of skin conductivity during continuous performance of tasks with different levels of complexity. It has been established that this method makes it possible to compare the level of cognitive load in participants with different initial levels of skin conductance, since it makes it possible to move from absolute values to relative ones at time intervals that are important for the researcher.