Head-mounted displays, particularly augmented reality HMDs, are being explored in construction to put essential project information, think drawings, 3D models, and step-by-step cues directly into a worker’s field of view while keeping hands free. Operational improvement is the incentive, enabling workers to stop consulting paper plans or a handheld device, reducing information “switches” during tool-intensive work and potentially supporting safer, more ergonomic execution.
While many of the previous studies have been performed in controlled laboratory environments using scaled-down tasks, unrealistic site conditions, or low-risk tools, researchers Yuhang Jia, Tanyel Bulbul, and Joseph L. Gabbard wanted to quantify the real-world trade-offs between performance, cognitive ergonomics, and physical ergonomics under realistic conditions and investigate the common assumption that perfectly aligned AR is always better.
Their study “Evaluation of Trade-Offs in Augmented Reality Head-Mounted Displays for Construction Assembly: Task Performance and Cognitive and Physical Ergonomics” examines how different AR HMDs affect real construction assembly work, using a high-risk, tool-intensive scenario: a full-scale wood frame wall assembly with a nail gun. The authors compared three guidance approaches, using a registered conformal AR, a nonregistered AR, and traditional paper, in a full-scale construction-simulated lab with experienced nail-gun users. Each participant completed three comparable wall builds under different display conditions, while researchers measured task outcomes, situational awareness, and mental workload via both subjective and objective instruments. Read more about how each technology performed and how you can apply these findings in your own work in the Journal of Architectural Engineering at https://ascelibrary.org/doi/10.1061/JAEIED.AEENG-2120. The abstract is below.
Abstract
Augmented reality (AR) head-mounted displays (HMDs) offer the potential to enhance construction task performance by enabling hands-free, real-time access to critical project information. Despite this promise, their impact on cognitive and physical ergonomics of workers remains underexplored due to challenges in creating realistic testing environments. This study investigates the use of AR HMDs with different display modalities in wood frame wall construction with a nail gun, focusing on their effects on task performance, situational awareness (SA), mental workload (MW), and physical movement. Three display conditions are evaluated: (1) a stereoscopic optical see-through HMD displaying registered conformal cues, (2) a monocular HMD showing static nonregistered informational diagrams, and (3) traditional printed documents as a baseline. The experiment was conducted in a full-scale, construction-simulated laboratory to enhance ecological validity, and a within-subjects design and vector-based analysis were employed to address individual variation within a small sample (n = 6) of carefully selected participants. Results show that the nonregistered HMD provided the best balance between task performance and SA in large-scale tasks, while the registered conformal AR HMD reduced specific assembly errors in small-scale tasks but increased MW and constrained physical movement due to visual occlusion. Compared to the paper condition, both AR HMDs resulted in more ergonomic postures and less dispersed motion. These findings highlight the need for AR systems that balance informational clarity with cognitive and physical demands, particularly in dynamic, high-risk environments like construction.
Explore the test results in detail and see whether augmented reality headsets would benefit the construction phase of your project in the ASCE Library: https://ascelibrary.org/doi/10.1061/JAEIED.AEENG-2120.
