Health Psychology Research / HPR / Volume 14 / Issue 1 / DOI: 10.14440/hpr.0132
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RESEARCH ARTICLE

Mental- and Temporal-Demand NASA-Task Load Index Scores Correlate with Decreases in Irisin Serum Levels in Healthy Individuals Subjected to 10-Day Bed Rest

Patrizia Pignataro1†* ,  Uros Marusic2,3† ,  Roberta Zerlotin4 ,  Angela Oranger4 ,  Manuela Dicarlo4 ,  Clelia Suriano1 ,  Paolo Taurisano1 ,  Rado Pišot2 ,  Boštjan Šimunič2 ,  Marco Narici5 ,  Maria Grano4 ,  Silvia Colucci1 ,  Graziana Colaianni4
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1 Department of Translational Biomedicine and Neuroscience, University of Bari, Bari 70121, Apulia, Italy
2 Institute for Kinesiology Research, Science and Research Centre Koper, Koper 6000, Slovenia
3 Department of Health Sciences, Alma Mater Europaea University, Maribor 2000, Slovenia
4 Department of Precision and Regenerative Medicine and Ionian Area, , University of Bari, Bari 70121, Apulia, Italy
5 Department of Biomedical Sciences, University of Padova, Padova 35122, Veneto, Italy
HPR 2026 , 14(1), e81240050; https://doi.org/10.14440/hpr.0132
Submitted: 14 May 2025 | Revised: 3 December 2025 | Accepted: 12 December 2025 | Published: 26 March 2026
© 2026 by the Author(s). Licensee Health Psychology Research, USA. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution -Noncommercial 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC 4.0) ( https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ )
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Abstract

Background

Bed rest (BR) is a widely used analogue of space flight that aims to replicate microgravity conditions, such as immobilization and a lack of sensorimotor stimuli. In a previous BR study, we evaluated the changes in irisin serum levels, a myokine produced mainly by skeletal muscle that exerts pleiotropic effects on several organs, including the brain.

Objective

Here, we evaluated whether the decline in circulating irisin concentrations during 10 days of horizontal BR correlated with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration Task Load Index (NASA-TLX).

Methods

NASA-TLX was obtained from young healthy participants at the end of the BR protocol. It is a self-report measure of task load that includes six subscales: mental demand, physical demand, temporal demand, performance, effort, and frustration. Each subscale score was correlated with the decline in serum irisin levels measured while participants were supine. Irisin decline was calculated as the difference between levels on the first day of BR (BR0) and the last day (BR9).

Results

Our results show a significant positive correlation between irisin decline and both mental demand and temporal demand, whereas correlations with the remaining subscales showed a positive association with irisin decline but did not reach statistical significance.

Conclusion

These findings suggest that reduced irisin levels are associated with increased perceived mental demand and time pressure (temporal demand) during BR. Because temporal demand can exacerbate high mental activity in a state of cognitive overload, maintaining higher circulating irisin levels could represent an effective countermeasure to improve the cognitive performance of participants during future BR studies and may help astronauts manage mental and temporal pressure during space missions.

Keywords
NASA Task Load Index
Workload assessment
Irisin
Bed rest immobilization
Healthy individuals
Funding
This work was supported by funding from Regione Puglia and CNR for the Tecnopolo per la Medicina di Precisione (D.G.R. No. 2117, 21 November 2018; CUPB84I18000540002), in collaboration with the University of Bari “Aldo Moro” to Maria Grano. Additional support was provided by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and the European Space Agency (ESA) (Grant No.4000128599/19/NL/PG), awarded to Maria Grano. The authors also acknowledge co-funding from Next Generation EU under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, Investment PE8 – Project Age-It: “Ageing Well in an Ageing Society”. This project was co-financed by the Next Generation EU (DM 1557, 11 October 2022; CUP: H33C22000680006) to Maria Grano.
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Conflict of interest
All authors declare that they have no financial or non-financial competing interests.
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Health Psychology Research, Electronic ISSN: 2420-8124 Published by Health Psychology Research
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