Not All Hazards are Created Equal: The Significance of Hazards in Inattentional Blindness for Static Driving Scenes

Pammer, Kristen; Bairnsfather, Jane E.; Burns, J. C.; Hellsing, Annika

doi:10.1002/acp.3153

Cited by 12 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 28 publications

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“…Importantly, the physical features of the animate and inanimate objects in this study were essentially identical, with the difference being how the object was contextualized (i.e., embedded in an advertisement or not). This effect of animacy was also observed across age groups and across trials and the effect is consistent with past studies involving both non-driving tasks as well as driving relevant scenes (Pammer and Blink, 2013; Calvillo and Jackson, 2014; Pammer et al, 2015; Calvillo and Hawkins, 2016; Topolšek et al, 2016).…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

“…In addition to the effects of the context, task, and load on inattentional blindness, the relevance of the unexpected object to the primary task itself may also be a contributing factor. In inattentional blindness studies, the target object of interest is often referred to as “irrelevant” to the main task or “unexpected.” The same may not be true in contextualized tasks such as driving where the environmental features and objects can differ and vary dynamically in terms of their relevance (e.g., proximity to roadway, or ability to interfere with the primary driving task) (Pammer and Blink, 2013; Pammer et al, 2015; Topolšek et al, 2016; Murphy and Greene, 2017a). Animacy is a characteristic that is particularly relevant in the context of driving given that it introduces the increased probability that the object could interfere/interact with the driving task.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…A driver should be prepared to avoid an animate object that has the potential to enter the roadway, whereas a stable, inanimate roadside object would be less of a concern. A study by Pammer et al (2015), in which participants were presented with photographs of driving scenes, revealed a reduction in the rate of inattentional blindness as the threat of a hazard increased (e.g., a child on the side of the road compared to an adult). What is not clear is whether these effects would be observed during dynamic driving tasks, and/or under conditions of higher load.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Inattentional Blindness During Driving in Younger and Older Adults

2019

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Age-related changes to perceptual and cognitive abilities have been implicated in an increased risk of collision in older adults. This may be due, in part, to their reduced ability to attend to potentially relevant aspects of their driving environment. An associated general phenomenon of inattentional blindness involves a failure to notice visually presented objects or events when attention is directed elsewhere. Previous studies of inattentional blindness using computer paradigms report higher incidence of this effect in older compared to younger adults. However, little is known about whether these age-related effects are observed during more complex, realistic, everyday tasks, such as driving. Therefore, the goal of this study was to explore whether younger and older adults differ in their awareness of objects in their driving environment when their attention is directed toward another primary driving task. This study took place in a high-fidelity, full field of view, driving simulator. Thirty-two younger ( M age = 25.41) and 32 older ( M age = 73.41) adults drove through 19 short scenarios and were asked to first judge whether their vehicle could fit between two rows of vehicles parked on either side of the road and then to perform the associated driving maneuver (i.e., drive through or drive around). On four critical trials, objects were placed on the side of the road that differed in terms of animacy. Specifically, animate objects consisted of 3D humans standing by a bus shelter and inanimate objects consisted of photographs of the same individuals on a bus shelter advertisement. Inattentional blindness was measured via a post-drive, tablet-based recognition task immediately following the critical trials. Results revealed high rates of inattentional blindness across both age groups, with significantly lower levels of awareness for inanimate objects compared to animate objects. Further, whereas younger adults demonstrated reduced inattentional blindness following the first critical trial, older adults did not show this immediate improvement in recognition performance. Overall, this study provides unique insights into the factors associated with age-related changes to attention and how they may affect important driving-related outcomes.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 91%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Inattentional Blindness During Driving in Younger and Older Adults

2019

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“…Several studies have examined the detection of objects that were relevant to how people performed the primary task but that were still unexpected (Pammer, Bairnsfather, Burns, & Hellsing, 2015 ). When asked to judge whether briefly presented photographs depicted safe or unsafe driving scenes, many people failed to notice pedestrians positioned unexpectedly near the road, and they were somewhat more likely to notice pedestrians who constituted more of a hazard.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Inattentional blindness for a gun during a simulated police vehicle stop

Simons

Schlösser

2017

Cogn. Research

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People often fail to notice unexpected objects and events when they are focusing attention on something else. Most studies of this “inattentional blindness” use unexpected objects that are irrelevant to the primary task and to the participant (e.g., gorillas in basketball games or colored shapes in computerized tracking tasks). Although a few studies have examined noticing rates for personally relevant or task-relevant unexpected objects, few have done so in a real-world context with objects that represent a direct threat to the participant. In this study, police academy trainees (n = 100) and experienced police officers (n = 75) engaged in a simulated vehicle traffic stop in which they approached a vehicle to issue a warning or citation for running a stop sign. The driver was either passive and cooperative or agitated and hostile when complying with the officer’s instructions. Overall, 58% of the trainees and 33% of the officers failed to notice a gun positioned in full view on the passenger dashboard. The driver’s style of interaction had little effect on noticing rates for either group. People can experience inattentional blindness for a potentially dangerous object in a naturalistic real-world context, even when noticing that object would change how they perform their primary task and even when their training focuses on awareness of potential threats.

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“…Inattentional blindness in cognitively-demanding situations can result in serious consequences, such as surgeons not seeing misplaced surgical instruments (Hughes-Hallett et al, 2015), radiologists not noticing unusual spots in a lung cancer screening scan AN EXAMINATION OF INATTENTIONAL BLINDNESS IN LAW ENFORCEMENT 3 (Drew et al, 2013), or security guards failing to see an unusual or suspicious individual on a security video feed (Nasholm et al, 2014). Inattentional blindness can result in distracted drivers not seeing a child about to enter traffic (Pammer et al, 2015), or an athlete not seeing an open teammate during a big game (Memmert & Furley, 2007).…”

Section: Inattentional Blindnessmentioning

confidence: 99%

An Examination of Inattentional Blindness in Law Enforcement in High Stress Situations

Lee¹,

O’Neill²,

Houlihan³

2018

LEEF

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Inattentional blindness, or the inability to visually detect an unexpected stimulus while attending to a task or situation, can have detrimental effects on those who are subject to the phenomenon. This may be particularly true for law enforcement officers, who are often engaged in cognitively demanding tasks that draw their attention away from potentially deadly hazards. This study aimed to look at the effects of inattentional blindness within a group of officers of varying degrees of experience and expertise. The officers were presented with a video-based scenario in which an unexpected stimulus was placed. The control group was asked to attend to a general task, while the experimental group was asked to attend to a specific and more demanding task. Within the context of an active shooter situation, the officers' ability to detect a large black suitcase in a hallway during the video was assessed. Overall rates of unexpected stimuli detection was consistent with existing literature, however detection of the scene-relevant stimulus was lower than expected.

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Not All Hazards are Created Equal: The Significance of Hazards in Inattentional Blindness for Static Driving Scenes

Cited by 12 publications

References 28 publications

Inattentional Blindness During Driving in Younger and Older Adults

Inattentional Blindness During Driving in Younger and Older Adults

Inattentional blindness for a gun during a simulated police vehicle stop

An Examination of Inattentional Blindness in Law Enforcement in High Stress Situations

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