DAILY VARIATIONS OF ALERTNESS AND FATIGUE SELF-ASSESSED AND TAPPING -A STUDY OF THE FACTORS OF MORNINGNESS AND GENDER

The present investigation attempted to establish the daily pattern of psychological tasks in a sample of Spanish subjects. Visual analogue s cales (alertness and fatigue) were selected as self-assessment tests. Tapping was selected as representing a simple motor task. Twenty subje cts, 10 men and 10 women, took part in the experiment. Six of them wer e morning types, 8 were neither-types, and 6 were evening types. A sig nificant daily variation was found, concerning tapping and subjective fatigue; both of them had its peak at 12 o 'clock noon, even if they d id not co-variate. A clear post-lunch effect could be found in the sco res of alertness and fatigue at 16 hours (4 p.m.). On the other hand, gender (sex) did not have a significant infuence in any of the three p arameters. Morningness influenced the daily functions of subjective al ertness and fatigue, with an advance in the phase of the morning type subjects of 7/8 hours in comparison with the evening type. Neither-typ e subjects remained in the intermediate position.