01519008

Component

Sleepy or drowsy drivers are much more at risk of being involved in a crash than drivers who are alert and vigilant. Although a large body of evidence has shown that sleepiness and drowsiness negatively affect vehicle control measures, no study has yet shown how such factors affect higher level, driving related cognitive skills such as hazard anticipation and hazard mitigation. These skills are critical ones because they have consistently been found to correlate with traffic crashes. In this study, the authors investigated how prolonged Total Awake Time (TAT), a prominent contributor to sleepiness and drowsiness, affects these higher order cognitive skills. Forty-eight experienced drivers completed two driving simulator evaluation sessions: pre-test and post-test. In each session, participants were asked to navigate a simulated world that included eight scenarios: four examined drivers’ hazard anticipation abilities and four examined their hazard mitigation abilities. While driving, all participants’ eye behaviors were measured. The results showed that drivers with the longer average TAT performed poorer in both measures compared to drivers with the shorter average TAT. To conclude, increases in TAT were found to have a detrimental effect on both higher cognitive driving skills. The implications for policy are discussed.

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

01503729

14-3297

English

14p

2014

Transportation Research Board 93rd Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Figures; References; Tables

Cognitive impairment; Driver performance; Driving simulators; Drowsiness; Eye movements; Highway safety; Sleep deprivation

Highways; Safety and Human Factors; I83: Accidents and the Human Factor

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2014 Paper #14-3297

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Jan 27 2014 3:08PM