Xianguang Jia

Simulator Evaluation of Drivers’ Performance on Rural Highways in relation to Drivers’ Visual Attention Demands

Aim of the study is to investigate, by means of a driving simulator experiment, drivers’ performance in terms of lateral position, speed, deceleration, steering angle, and breaking times on a divided two-lane rural highway in relation to drivers’ visual attention (VD). In the experiment, the virtual scene of twenty different geometric alignment sections without traffic and the VD testing were designed. Twenty-three experienced drivers with the calibration of attention capacity participated in a 30 km drive in an interactive fixed-base simulator. Each participant was required to drive with the controlled speed of 60 km/h along the central lane as repeating random number and was evaluated on VD and driving performances. Three different data analysis techniques were used: (a) statistical tests and hypothesis test of curvature change rate (CCR) of the geometric alignments, visual attention demands, and driving performance data, (b) correlation analysis of VD, CCRs, and driving behaviors, and (c) regression analysis of the VD and CCRs. Results have showed that the driving performance can be effectively influenced by the highway alignment and a prediction model built in this study can evaluate the drivers’ visual attention demands before the highway constructed. The interactions among VD, driving behavior, and CCRs were also found.

Traffic Cognitions, Behaviors, and Education of Child Pedestrians: A Case Study in Kunming, China

There are over 18,500 children below the age of 14 that died from traffic accidents every year in China. The death rate in China is 2.5 times more than that in Europe and 2.6 times compared to the USA. Researchers have shown that half of children’s traffic accidents were caused by their own negligence. One of countermeasures is to enhance the children’s traffic cognition which can not only reduce the traffic accidents in childhood, but also help them become good drivers when they grow up, and therefore improve the traffic system of the society. This article designed a questionnaire of child pedestrian’s traffic knowledge, cognition, behavior, and attitude from them and their parents which suits for a developing country’s city—Kunming (in China). Based on the data from 122 primary school-aged children of the city, the child pedestrian’s traffic cognition and behaviors were analyzed by statistics including Pearson, Spearman’s rho and Kendall’s rank correlation. The results showed that there was a considerable difference between the child pedestrian’s traffic cognition and behaviors (r=0.805, p =0.005), and a significant correlation between children and parents behaviors (Kendall: rk=0.079, P=0.032; Spearman: rs=0.086, P=0.038). Due to the weakness in the traffic safety education from parents, school, and government for child pedestrians, some feasible educational and practical measures on educating children’s traffic safety were put forward for cities in developing countries.