Characterizing the Effect of Videophone Conversations on Intersection Driving Performance

Abstract

Summary:The present study examined the efficacy of videophone conversations for enhancing conversation partner situational awareness and mitigating cell phone distraction during intersection drives. Younger and older drivers drove through simulated intersections in four conditions: undistracted, with an in-car passenger, with a remote partner who could see the driver and a subset of the driving scene via a videophone, and with a remote partner on a cell phone. Relative to the cell phone condition, passenger and videophone conversations enhanced situational awareness and mitigated distraction. Younger and older drivers showed similar benefits, although there were age-related costs to driving performance overall. Videophone information offers a simple and promising potential strategy to enhance partner situational awareness during cell phone conversations, even when the conversation partner can see only a subset of the driving scene.

Older Adult Multitasking Performance Using a Gaze-Contingent Useful Field of View

“…Indeed, older drivers show impaired scanning behavior relative to younger drivers, and importantly, their scanning can be improved through training, suggesting that these limitations are not strictly physical (Romoser & Fisher, 2009a, 2009b; Yamani, Samuel, Gerardino, & Fisher, 2016). Compared with younger adults, older adults show increased susceptibility to dual-task costs of conversing while driving through intersections (Gaspar, Carbonari, Kaczmarski, & Kramer, 2015). This mirrors the age-related increase in dual-task costs shown in other driving tasks (Becic et al, 2010; McCarley et al, 2004).…”