The 21st century has brought a growing and significant focus on performance and health within the workforce, with the aim of improving the health and performance of the blue- and white-collar workforce. The present research investigated heart rate variability (HRV) and psychological performance between blue and white-collar workers to determine if differences were evident. A total of 101 workers (n = 48 white-collar, n = 53 blue-collar, aged 19-61 years) underwent a three lead electrocardiogram to obtain HRV data during baseline (10 min) and active (working memory and attention) phases. The Cambridge Neuropsychological Test Automated Battery, specifically the spatial working memory, attention switching task, rapid visual processing and the spatial span, were used. Differences in neurocognitive performance measures indicated that white-collar workers were better able to detect sequences and make less errors than blue-collar workers. The heart rate variability differences showed that white-collar workers exhibit lower levels of cardiac vagal control during these neuropsychological tasks. These initial findings provide some novel insights into the relationship between occupation and psychophysiological processes and further highlight the interactions between cardiac autonomic variables and neurocognitive performance in blue and white-collar workers.
Keywords: autonomic nervous system; cognitive performance; executive function; heart rate variability; working memory.