Modernization of the Driver Behaviour Questionnaire.

INTRODUCTION: The current study builds on previous versions of the Driver Behaviour Questionnaire (DBQ) by incorporating a larger sample of driving behaviors targeting inattention, distraction, aggressive driving, and health related to aging. The goals of this study were to determine if the resulting factor structure was consistent with a more contemporary view of unsafe driving behaviors, and to determine whether scores on the factors could predict self-reported collisions and police citations. METHODS: The instrument was given to a sample of 3295 drivers ranging in age from 19 to 80+ years old. It was divided in two sections, the first to provide demographic information and driving history data and the second containing 105 driver behavior questions. RESULTS: An exploratory factor analysis resulted in a 65-item scale organized in four factors. The factors were labeled tentatively as Inattention Errors, Age-Related Problems, Distraction and Hurry, and Aggressive Violations. Regression analyses showed that the factors were predictors of self-reported, at-fault collisions and police citations. PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS: The factor scores found in this research are consistent with a useful theoretical framework for understanding unsafe driver actions, and demonstrate some potential to identify several individual difference variables that predict self-reported collisions and citations.

Driving Skills Training for Older Adults: An Assessment of DriveSharp.

RÉSUMÉ Les procédures de formation cognitive informatique visent à augmenter la sécurité en améliorant les compétences relatives à la conduite, comme la vitesse-de-traitement et le Useful Field of View. L'étude actuelle a évalué l'efficacité du DriveSharp dans la formation des conducteurs âgés dans un cadre de classe réaliste. Les participants (n = 24) ont assisté à 10 heures de cours de DriveSharp pendant 5 semaines. Les séances pré- et post-test ont evalués améliorations sur un essai dynamique de la perception du risque, Trails A et Trails B. Un groupe de contrôle (n = 18) a terminé seulement les séances pré- et post-test. En classe, les temps de formation étaient plus bas que prévus. L'amélioration des participants aux jeux ont stabilisée après la première évaluation, et le groupe de DriveSharp n'a pas démontré une amélioration significative des performances sur les tests, par rapport au groupe de contrôle. Parmi plusieurs questions relatives à la facilité d'utilisation, les plus problématiques étaient le malentendudes objectifs de la tâche et la différence entre la formation et l'évaluation. Il y a plusieurs implications pour ceux qui utilisent DriveSharp pour améliorer la sécurité des conducteurs âgés.

Predicting On-Road Driving Performance and Safety in Cognitively Impaired Older Adults.

OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the ability to predict on-road driving in cognitively impaired older drivers. DESIGN: Cross-sectional observational study. SETTING: Laboratory tests and on-road assessment. PARTICIPANTS: Drivers with cognitive impairment (Mini-Mental State Examination score < 26, N = 43, mean age 74). MEASUREMENTS: The Roadwise Review, a hazard perception test (HPT), several vision tests, and a standardized 18-km driving assessment. RESULTS: The best prediction of passing or failing the on-road test was a combination of the HPT, leg strength, visual acuity, visual search and working memory, and number of medications taken (Nagelkerke coefficient of determination = 0.40). The sensitivity of the model was 71%, and the specificity was 75%. CONCLUSION: Further research is required to determine how these tests may be used or combined with other data (e.g., medical history) to assess fitness to drive of cognitively impaired older drivers.

Aging and the inhibition of competing hypotheses during visual word identification: evidence from the progressive demasking task.

Two experiments used the progressive demasking (PD) task to examine age differences in the ability to inhibit higher frequency competitors during the process of identifying a visually degraded word. In Experiment 1, older adults exhibited a larger inhibitory neighborhood frequency effect (i.e., slower identification of words with many higher frequency competitors) than younger adults, but additional analyses indicated that this difference could be explained by general slowing rather than a deficit in inhibitory abilities. In Experiment 2, a primed version of the PD task was used to promote hypothesis testing by semantically priming the target word (e.g., cry-weep) or a higher frequency competitor of the target (e.g, day-weep) prior to the onset of the demasking sequence. Although older adults were more likely to make identification errors consistent with an inhibitory deficit (e.g., identifying weep as week), these errors were infrequent overall and there was no corresponding evidence of a larger interference effect in the older adults' identification latencies. Taken together, performance in these two tasks provides little evidence of reduced inhibitory functioning in older adults. The implications for the inhibitory deficit hypothesis of cognitive aging and directions for future are discussed.

Predicting on-road driving performance and safety in healthy older adults.

INTRODUCTION: This study evaluated the ability to predict the on-road driving of older drivers using a battery of laboratory-based instruments. METHODS: The Roadwise Review, a brief Hazard Perception Test and several tests of vision were given to 65 cognitively healthy, licensed older drivers (M = 74 years, SD = 9 years). They also participated in a standardized driving assessment of approximately 18 km, along a mixed residential and commercial route. RESULTS: Raw scores on the Roadwise Review did not predict accumulated points, or automatic disqualifications, but could predict who would pass or fail the on-road evaluation. The number of serious problems (excluding head and neck flexibility) that were identified by the Roadwise Review was a significant predictor of automatic disqualifications, and a significant predictor of passing or failing the on-road assessment. The Hazard Perception Test approached significance when predicting accumulated points and was a significant predictor of automatic disqualifications, as well as pass/fail outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: The best model for predicting passing or failing the on-road assessment included the Hazard Perception Test, color vision, and, a measure of walking speed from the Roadwise Review, which yielded a sensitivity of 82% and a specificity of 69% (AROC = .80). Future work will need to determine how these tests can be used with other information (e.g., medical history) to yield better diagnoses of fitness to drive, particularly among those who are medically at risk.

Short-term reliability of a brief hazard perception test.

Hazard perception tests (HPTs) have been successfully implemented in some countries as a part of the driver licensing process and, while their validity has been evaluated, their short-term stability is unknown. This study examined the short-term reliability of a brief, dynamic version of the HPT. Fifty-five young adults (Mage=21 yrs) with at least two years of post-licensing driving experience completed parallel, 21-scene HPTs with a one-month interval separating each test. Minimal practice effects (∼0.1s) were manifested. Internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha) averaged 0.73 for the two forms. The correlation between the two tests was 0.55 (p<0.001) and correcting for lack of reliability increased the correlation to 0.72. Thus, a brief form of the HPT demonstrates acceptable short-term reliability in drivers whose hazard perception should be stable, an important feature for implementation and consumer acceptance. One implication of these results is that valid HPT scores should predict future crash risk, a desirable property for user acceptance of such tests. However, short-term stability should be assessed over longer periods and in other driver groups, particularly novices and older adults, in whom inter-individual differences in the development of hazard perception skill may render HPT tests unstable, even over short intervals.

The Driver Behaviour Questionnaire: a North American analysis.

INTRODUCTION: The Driver Behaviour Questionnaire (DBQ), originally developed in Britain by Reason et al. [Reason, J., Manstead, A., Stradling, S., Baxter, J., & Campbell, K. (1990). Errors and violations on the road: A real distinction? Ergonomics, 33, 1315-1332] is one of the most widely used instruments for measuring driver behaviors linked to collision risk. METHOD: The goals of the study were to adapt the DBQ for a North American driving population, assess the component structure of the items, and to determine whether scores on the DBQ could predict self-reported traffic collisions. RESULTS: Of the original Reason et al. items, our data indicate a two-component solution involving errors and violations. Evidence for a Lapses component was not found. The 20 items most closely resembling those of Parker et al. [Parker, D., Reason, J. T., Manstead, A. S. R., & Stradling, S. G. (1995). Driving errors, driving violations and accident involvement. Ergonomics, 38, 1036-1048] yielded a solution with 3 orthogonal components that reflect errors, lapses, and violations. Although violations and Lapses were positively and significantly correlated with self-reported collision involvement, the classification accuracy of the resulting models was quite poor. PRACTICAL APPLICATIONS: A North American DBQ has the same component structure as reported previously, but has limited ability to predict self-reported collisions.

Consensus statements on the assessment of older drivers.

BACKGROUND: The rapidly increasing number of older drivers is accentuating the challenges in concurrently identifying older drivers posing an unacceptable risk if they continue to drive, while not discriminating against those capable of safely driving. Attendees of an invitational meeting about the assessment of older drivers were asked to participate in a modified Delphi process designed to develop consensus statements on the assessment of older drivers. METHODS: Forty-one non-student symposium attendees were invited to participate in two rounds of a survey, in which they were asked to indicate their level of agreement (or disagreement) on a five-point Likert scale to a series of statements about the assessment of older drivers. Consensus was defined as 80% + of respondents either agreeing or disagreeing with a statement. RESULTS: More than one-half (n = 23) completed the first round of the survey and 12 participated in the second. There was consensus on the need for a modifiable, fair, rational, and widely accessible multi-step approach to the assessment of older drivers. This would require the engagement and support of physicians and other health-care practitioners in identifying and reporting medically at-risk drivers of any age. At a societal level, alternatives to driving a personal motor vehicle should be developed. CONCLUSIONS: An on-going dialogue about this complex issue is required. Decisions should be based on explicitly stated principles and informed by the best available evidence.

A comparison of static and dynamic hazard perception tests.

Hazard perception is a vital component to safe driving and hazard perception tests (HPTs) are being used with greater frequency for driver training, assessment and licensure. In this study, we compared a dynamic HPT (Scialfa et al., 2011), which presents short video scenes to observers and a static HPT (Scialfa et al., 2012), which uses still images. Both tests require the observer to indicate the presence of a traffic conflict that would lead to a collision between the "camera" vehicle and another road user or fixed object. Young adult drivers (n=56) completed both forms of the HPT, along with a modified version of the Driver Behavior Questionnaire (Reason et al., 1990) and a measure of simple reaction time. Self-reported collision and moving violation data were also collected. As in previous work, both static and dynamic HPTs had good reliability. The correlation between composite static and dynamic scores was approximately .40, but was reduced to approximately .25 when simple reaction time was controlled. Both HPTs predicted lapses and errors on the Driver Behavior Questionnaire, but neither predicted self-reported collisions or moving violations. Discussion focuses on the differences in visual cues available in dynamic and static scenes and how these differences could influence decisions about potential hazards.

Aging and visual crowding.

OBJECTIVES: The ability to perceive high spatial frequencies (i.e., fine detail) is impaired when contours are placed near the detail to be resolved (Bouma, H. [1970]. Interaction effects in parafoveal letter recognition. Nature, 226, 177-178. doi:10.1038/226177a0; Flom, M. C., Weymouth, F. W., & Kahneman, D. [1963]. Visual resolution and contour interaction. Journal of the Optical Society of America A, 53, 1026-1032. doi:10.1364/JOSA.53.001026.). This visual crowding is more pronounced outside of central vision and may be more pronounced in older adults. Thus, the motivation for the present study. METHOD: Younger (M = 20.95 years) and older adults (M = 70.32 years) detected gap orientation in a Landolt C presented at 3° or 6° either alone or flanked by bars of the same spatial scale. RESULTS: Both age groups demonstrated a visual crowding effect, in that acuity deteriorated in the flanking condition, an effect that grew with eccentricity. Older adults exhibited a larger crowding effect, particularly at 6°. Younger adults tested at reduced illumination did not show the crowding effect of older adults. Thus, age differences do not appear to result from reduced retinal illumination. When the crowding effect was operationalized as the ratio of crowded to uncrowded acuity, age differences were eliminated at both 3° and 6°. DISCUSSION: These data have implications for understanding age differences in functional vision, including reading and visual search.

Minimal age-related deficits in task switching, inhibition, and oculomotor control.

UNLABELLED: BACKGROUND/STUDY CONTEXT: We are often required to carry out complex tasks in changing, context-dependent ways. This task switching requires the rapid realignment of attention to task constraints and may be age sensitive. METHODS: Three experiments, two in which eye movements were recorded, were conducted to assess age-related differences in task switching and inhibitory control. Observers carried out a Same-Different task and Go-No Go task in single and mixed blocks of trials. RESULTS: Other than Experiment 1, although switch costs were observed, they were not larger for older adults compared to younger adults. Furthermore, eye movement and false alarm data demonstrated little evidence of age-related decline in inhibitory and oculomotor control. CONCLUSIONS: A major implication is that, at least when two tasks involve different stimuli and unique responses, older adults are no more likely than younger adults to show task-switching costs or inhibition deficit.

The effects of driving experience on responses to a static hazard perception test.

Novice drivers exhibit deficits in hazard perception that are likely to increase their risk of collisions. We developed a static hazard perception test that presents still images to observers and requires them to indicate the presence of a traffic conflict that would lead to a collision. Responses to these scenes were obtained for young adult novice (N=29) and experienced drivers (N=27). Additionally, participants rated the hazard risk and clutter of each scene. Novice drivers rated traffic conflicts as less hazardous and responded more slowly to them. Using a subset of 21 scenes, we were able to discriminate novice and experienced young adult drivers with a classification accuracy of 78% and a scale reliability (Cronbach's alpha) of .91. The potential applications of this research include the development of standardized hazard perception tests that can be used for driver evaluation, training and licensure.

A hazard perception test for novice drivers.

We developed a hazard perception test, modeled on that used currently in several Australian states, that presents short video scenes to observers and requires them to indicate the presence of a traffic conflict that would lead to a collision between the "camera" vehicle and another road user. After eliminating those scenes that were problematic (e.g., many observers did not recognize the hazard), we predicted driver group (novice vs. experienced drivers of similar age) on the basis of individual differences in reaction time, miss rate and false alarm rate. Novices were significantly slower in responding to hazards, even after controlling for age and simple reaction time. After selecting those scenes with the larger group differences, an 18-scene test that would be useful for mass testing exhibited even larger experience effects. There was good reliability in the resulting scale. Results suggest that this brief test of hazard perception can discriminate groups that differ in driving experience. Implications for driver licensing, evaluation and training are discussed.

Improving older drivers' hazard perception ability.

One reason that older drivers may have elevated crash risk is because they anticipate hazardous situations less well than middle-aged drivers. Hazard perception ability has been found to be amenable to training in young drivers. This article reports an experiment in which video-based hazard perception training was given to drivers who were between the ages of 65 and 94 years. Trained participants were significantly faster at anticipating traffic hazards compared with an untrained control group, and this benefit was present even after the authors controlled for pretraining ability. If future research shows these effects to be robust, the implications for driver training and safety are significant.

Age differences in the distractor-ratio effect as a function of contrast level.

Latencies (RT) and eye movement measures were used to examine the effects of age and contrast on the distractor-ratio effect (DRE) in visual search. Younger and older adults performed a contrast x orientation conjunction search task where the ratios of white to black distractors and luminance contrast levels were varied. The distractor-ratio manipulation had similar effects for older and younger adults on both RT and the number of fixations required to find the target. Both measures were largely independent of distractor ratio on target-present trials, while both RTs and the fixation number increased with the number of items sharing the target's contrast polarity on target-absent trials. A more detailed analysis of eye movements suggested that younger adults were a bit more adept at attending to the smaller set of distractors, which presumably facilitated both overt and covert search. Generalized slowing can account for the age differences in RT, but the fixation number data speak to another mechanism, perhaps increased cautiousness on the part of the elderly when signal strength is low.

Gaze behavior of spotters during an air-to-ground search.

OBJECTIVE: This study was designed to develop methods for evaluating the gaze behaviors of spotters during air-to-ground search and to compare field-derived measures with previous lab results. Secondary aims were to assess adherence to a prescribed scan path, evaluate search effectiveness, and determine the predictors of task success. BACKGROUND: Crashed aircraft must be located quickly to minimize loss of life, often requiring visual search from the air. METHOD: Eye movements were measured in 10 volunteer spotters while they searched from the air for ground targets. Visual acuity, contrast levels, and performance on a lab-based search task were also measured. RESULTS: Results were similar to those of previous lab-based studies of air-to-ground search. Task success could be predicted best from a combination of gaze and laboratory variables, and as in previous research, experience was not one of them. CONCLUSIONS: In both lab and field research, performance is poor. Improvements in air search and rescue success will depend upon improvements in training, the refinement of scan tactics, changes to the task methods or environment, or modifications to parameters of the search exercise. APPLICATION: Spotters were unable to reliably search their assigned area, which has implications for the current search training program and in-the-air protocol.

Does impaired executive functioning differentially impact verbal memory measures in older adults with suspected dementia?

The purpose of this study was to examine whether executive dysfunction differentially impacts list-learning and story recall tasks in a sample of older adults referred for suspected cognitive impairment. Older adults (N = 61) with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or probable mild dementia, and those who did not meet criteria for diagnosis of dementia, were assessed using measures of executive function and verbal memory. Two groups were established based on performance on measures of executive function: (a) the No Executive Dysfunction group (NoED; n = 33) consisted of persons without impairment on any obtained measures of executive function; and (b) the Executive Dysfunction group (ED; n = 28) contained persons with impairment on at least one of the measures of executive function. The two groups were compared on performance on two measures of verbal memory, the California Verbal Learning Test-II (CVLT-II) and the Logical Memory (LM) subtest from the Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised (WMS-R). The NoED group performed significantly better than the ED group on the total learning and short delay free recall trials of the CVLT-II. However, there were no significant differences between the groups on the other indices of the CVLT-II (i.e., long delay free recall, recognition, recall repetitions, recall intrusions, or recognition false-positives) or on the immediate and delayed recall trials of the LM measure. These results support previous research demonstrating the impact of executive dysfunction on the acquisition of and short-delay retrieval of verbal information in older adults with suspected cognitive impairment.

Aging, memory and visual search.

Potential age-related differences in the memory processes that underlie visual search are examined in the present study. Using a dynamic, gaze-contingent search paradigm developed to assess memory for previously examined distractors, older adults demonstrated no memory deficit. Surprisingly, older adults made fewer refixations compared to their younger counterparts, indicating better memory for previously inspected objects. This improved memory was not the result of a speed-accuracy trade-off or larger Inhibition-of-Return effects for older than for younger adults. Additional analyses suggested that older adults may derive their benefit from finer spatial encoding of search items. These findings suggest that some of the memory processes that support visual search are relatively age invariant.

Predictors of web navigation performance in a life span sample of adults.

The influence of age, subject matter knowledge, working memory, reading abilities, spatial abilities, and processing speed on Web navigation was assessed in a sample of 41 participants between the ages of 19 and 83 years. Each participant navigated a stand-alone tourism Web site to find answers to 12 questions. Performance was measured using time per trial, number of pages per trial, and number of revisited pages per trial. Age did not influence the number of total pages or repeat pages visited, which were predicted by domain knowledge, working memory, and processing speed. Age was associated with slower times per trial, and the effect remained significant after controlling for working memory, processing speed, and spatial abilities. Only with the addition of subject matter knowledge and World Wide Web experience was the age effect eliminated. Actual or potential applications of this research include redesigning Web sites to minimize memory demands and enhance visual segmentation. The data also suggest that age differences in Web navigation can be offset partially by taking advantage of older adults' prior experiences in the domain.

Examining task difficulty and the time course of inhibition of return: detecting perceptually degraded targets.

The ability to efficiently direct visual attention to salient features in the environment is a critical function of the visual system. The finding that people are slower to detect a target that appears at a previously cued location is thought to reflect a mechanism known as inhibition of return (IOR). Past research has shown that difficult target discriminations result in a greater amount of time needed to inhibit previously attended locations (i.e., a delayed onset of inhibition), suggesting that task difficulty plays a critical role in the allocation of attention. In this study, IOR was measured at a wide range of SOAs while participants detected either a perceptually degraded target or a standard, high luminance target. When responses were made to a perceptually degraded target, the time course of IOR was delayed by approximately 250 ms (relative to the control group), suggesting that the difficulty in detecting targets also influences the allocation of attention. The results are consistent with the notion that IOR is not simply a reflexive subcortical mechanism but rather involves top-down attentional control settings.