Models of driving behavior: A review of their evolution

https://doi.org/10.1016/0001-4575(94)90051-5Get rights and content

Abstract

This paper reviews models that emphasize the cognitive components of driving behavior. Studies of individual differences have sought predictors of accident histories. Typically low correlations and reliance on post hoc explanations reflect theoretical deficiencies and problems with the use of accident measures. Motivational models emphasize transient, situation-specific factors rather than stable, individual predictors. However, neither testable hypotheses nor suitable methods have been developed to study situational factors and motives that influence driving. More recent models have incorporated a hierarchical control structure, which assumes concurrent activity at strategic, maneuvering, and operational levels of control. At the same time, automaticity has emerged as a central construct in cognitive psychology. All activities are assumed to combine fast, automatic components with slower, more deliberate, controlled processing. It is argued that identifying the situational factors that increase drivers' uncertainty and thus trigger a shift in attention from automatic to controlled processing will help integrate concepts of automaticity and motivational models. Finally, recent theorizing has suggested that errors associated with the inherent variability of human behavior may be more important to roadway crash causation than systematic errors, which are attributable to the known limits of the human information-processing system. Drivers' abilities to recover from errors may also be important to crash causation. It is concluded that the hierarchical control structure and theories of automaticity and errors provide the potential tools for defining alternative criterion measures, such as safety margins, and developing testable theories of driving behavior and crash causation. Two examples of models that integrate information-processing mechanisms within a motivational framework are described.

References (102)

  • A.M. Treisman et al.

    A feature-integration theory of attention

    Cognitive Psychology

    (1980)
  • R.W. Allen et al.

    Analysis of man-in-the-loop performance measurement for crash avoidance research

  • W. Arthur et al.

    Locus of control and auditory selective attention as predictors of driving accident involvement: A comparative longitudinal investigation

    Human Performance

    (1991)
  • B.J. Avolio et al.

    Designing a measure of visual selective attention to assess individual differences in information processing

    Applied Psychological Measurement

    (1981)
  • B.J. Avolio et al.

    Individual differences in information-processing ability as a predictor of motor vehicle accidents

    Hum. Factors

    (1985)
  • K. Ball et al.

    Identifying correlates of accident involvement for the older driver

    Hum. Factors

    (1991)
  • K. Ball et al.

    Visual attention problems as a predictor of vehicle crashes among older drivers

    Invest. Opthalmol. Vis. Sci.

    (1993)
  • G.B. Barrett et al.

    Analysis and performance requirements for driving decision making in emergency situations

  • G.V. Barrett et al.

    Relationship between perceptual style and driver reaction to an emergency situation

    J. Appl. Psychol.

    (1968)
  • B. Brehmer

    Variable errors set a limit to adaptation

    Ergonomics

    (1990)
  • D.E. Broadbent

    Perception and communication

    (1958)
  • I.D. Brown

    Driver's margins of safety considered as a focus for research on error

    Ergonomics

    (1990)
  • I. Brown et al.

    Editorial: A way with errors

    Ergonomics

    (1990)
  • I. Brown et al.

    Editorial

    Ergonomics

    (1988)
  • B.L. Cole et al.

    Drivers don't search: they just notice

  • D. Doverspike et al.

    The auditory selective attention test: A review of field and laboratory studies

    Educational and Psychological Measurement

    (1986)
  • J. Duncan

    Goal weighting and the choice of behavior in a complex world

    Ergonomics

    (1990)
  • L. Evans

    Traffic safety and the driver

    (1991)
  • M.W. Eysenck

    Attention and arousal: Cognition and performance

    (1982)
  • A.D. Fisk et al.

    Task versus component consistency in automatic process development: Consistent attending versus consistent responding

    Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society

    (1984)
  • A.D. Fisk et al.

    Category and word search: Generalizing search principles to complex processing

    J. Exp. Pscyhol. Learn. Mem. Cogn.

    (1983)
  • A.D. Fisk et al.

    Automatic and controlled processing theory and its applications to human factors problems

  • A.D. Fisk et al.

    Examination of the role of “higher-order” consistency in skill development

    Hum. Factors

    (1988)
  • R.A. Fuller

    Conceptualisation of driving behaviour as threat avoidance

    Ergonomics

    (1984)
  • R. Fuller

    On learning to make risky decisions

    Ergonomics

    (1988)
  • J.J. Gibson

    The senses considered as perceptual systems

    (1966)
  • J.J. Gibson et al.

    A theoretial field-analysis of automobile driving

    Am. J. Psychol.

    (1938)
  • D.R. Goodenough

    A review of individual differences in field dependence as a factor in auto safety

    Hum. Factors

    (1976)
  • D. Gopher et al.

    Individual differences in attention and the prediction of flight criteria

    Percep. Mot. Skills

    (1971)
  • J.A. Groeger

    Drivers' errors in, and out of, context

    Ergonomics

    (1990)
  • A.R. Hale et al.

    Human error models as predictors of accident scenarios for designers in road transport systems

    Ergonomics

    (1990)
  • R.M. Harano et al.

    The prediction of accident liability through biographical data and psychometric tests

    J. Safety Res.

    (1975)
  • B.L. Hills

    Vision, visibility, and perception in driving

    Perception

    (1980)
  • R.D. Huguenin

    The concept of risk and behaviour models in traffic psychology

    Ergonomics

    (1988)
  • Insurance Research Council

    Adequacy of motor vehicle records in evaluating driver performance

    (1991)
  • W. Janssen et al.

    Risk homeostasis theory and its critics: Time for an agreement

    Ergonomics

    (1988)
  • G. Johansson et al.

    Drivers and road signs

    Ergonomics

    (1970)
  • G. Johansson et al.

    Drivers and road signs: A preliminary investigation of the capacity of car drivers to get information from road signs

    Ergonomics

    (1966)
  • I.R. Johnston et al.

    Driver behavior research needs and priorities

  • W.A. Johnston et al.

    Selective attention

    Annu. Rev. Psychol.

    (1986)
  • Cited by (408)

    • How does background music affect drivers’ behaviours, emotions and mood behind the wheel?

      2023, Transportation Research Part F: Traffic Psychology and Behaviour
    View all citing articles on Scopus
    View full text