Driver Safety and the Boomer Dilemma: A Pilot Study for "Advanced Driver Training" as Addressing the Attention Challenge

As the post-WWII generation enters middle age and early senior adult stage, there is increasing cause for alarm--and for systematic response. Research in traffic safety and human cognition and perception indicates, as we get older, driving becomes more challenging for a number of physiological and psychological reasons. Foremost among these is attention. By some counts, 43 percent of traffic accidents are caused by inattention to the road due to people either failing to process efficaciously or accurately the environment of roadways and other vehicles or their being diverted by activities ranging from cell phone use to eating to attending to kids in the back seat. It is unlikely that such numbers will change for a group that (a) values driving as a right and not a privilege, (b) is at this time among the safest drivers, and (c) does not respond positively to messages implying "you are getting old." Our interdisciplinary team will develop a multi-tiered "Advanced Driver Training" (ADT) course that ranges from an interactive media presentation (delivered via a CD or the Web) to actual on-the-road training. Integral to such a program will be a Social Marketing campaign that links driver training to friendly and familiar boomer messages of "self-improvement" and "professional training." We seek funds to produce a pilot project that: (1) develops an ADT program and tests the efficacy of an ADT interactive presentation in terms of improving simulated driver performance; (2) creates and tests the efficacy of a persuasion campaign to convince boomer-generation drivers to seek out and participate in ADT; and (3) serves as the basis for seeking greater outside private and government funding for larger versions of the ADT program.

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Sponsor Organizations:

  University of Kansas, Lawrence

  Transportation Research Institute
  2117 Learned Hall, 1530 W 15th Street
  Lawrence, KS  United States  66045
• Performing Organizations:

  University of Kansas, Lawrence

  Transportation Research Institute
  2117 Learned Hall, 1530 W 15th Street
  Lawrence, KS  United States  66045
• Principal Investigators:

  Agah, Arvin

  Bai, Yong

  Geana, Mugur

  Atchley, Paul

• Start Date: 20081000
• Expected Completion Date: 0
• Actual Completion Date: 0
• Source Data: RiP Project 16730

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Aged; Aged drivers; Attention; Behavior; Cognitive impairment; Driver licenses; Driver training; Driving; Research projects; Traffic safety
• Subject Areas: Highways; Safety and Human Factors;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01460033
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: University of Kansas, Lawrence
• Files: UTC, RIP
• Created Date: Jan 3 2013 1:17PM