01552337

Component

Drivers may be more willing to engage in secondary tasks in less demanding roadway situations or while stopped. However, real-world data on this topic are scarce. Roadside observations are a cost-effective way to measure the prevalence of secondary tasks, but few efforts have evaluated the reliability of this approach. Two trained observers independently recorded the presence of 14 secondary tasks among 2,580 drivers in the same vehicles in 5 different roadway situations (straightaway, moving and stopped traffic at a signalized intersection, stop-sign controlled intersection, roundabout) in an urbanized area. The agreement between their observations was compared using the Kappa statistic (Κ). Overall, each driver and vehicle characteristic and almost every secondary task was reliably observed with moderate (Κ = 0.41-0.60) to substantial (Κ = 0.61-0.80) agreement. Daytime observations of many secondary tasks in each roadway situation were found to be reliable, although observations of drivers with a Bluetooth earpiece or headset with microphone were not reliable in any roadway situation. The Kappa coefficients for a few secondary tasks may have been low because they were rarely observed. The Kappa coefficient was lower during nighttime observations compared with daytime observations for almost every secondary task. This may be in part because night vision provides less resolution and detail than daytime vision. The findings from this pilot study will support a larger roadside observational study examining secondary tasks in different roadway situations at different times of day while accounting for different characteristics of the roadway and driving population.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee AND10 Vehicle User Characteristics.

01550057

15-3992

English

12p

2015

Transportation Research Board 94th Annual Meeting

Digital/other

References (20) ; Tables

Cost effectiveness; Data quality; Distraction; Drivers; Empirical methods; Intersections; Multitasking; Traffic; Urban areas

Data and Information Technology; Highways; Safety and Human Factors; I73: Traffic Control; I83: Accidents and the Human Factor

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2015 Paper #15-3992

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Dec 30 2014 1:18PM