Driving in the Fog: Speed Illusions Caused by Variations of Object Contrast. Accurate judgement of the speed of 3D motion is essential to many real world tasks, from driving a vehicle to playing sports. Illusions of perceived speed can occur when the range of brightness levels (ie. the contrast) is reduced, such as in fog, when suffering from cataracts, or when using some sunglasses. This raises issues of safety for drivers (pilots/captains etc). It is expected that advances in the understanding ....Driving in the Fog: Speed Illusions Caused by Variations of Object Contrast. Accurate judgement of the speed of 3D motion is essential to many real world tasks, from driving a vehicle to playing sports. Illusions of perceived speed can occur when the range of brightness levels (ie. the contrast) is reduced, such as in fog, when suffering from cataracts, or when using some sunglasses. This raises issues of safety for drivers (pilots/captains etc). It is expected that advances in the understanding of these effects will inform road safety policy and practice to benefit drivers and pedestrians and to guide the manufacturing of eyewear and display devices (eg. military heads-up-displays). It is also anticipated that this project will be able to answer the much-debated question 'What colour should cricket balls be?'
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Functional Assessment of Head-eye Coordination during Driving. 238 people per 100,000 population were hospitalized and 9 people per 100,000 died as a result of road-transport related injury in Australia in 2002. We will address this issue by assessing the head eye coordination strategies for young drivers, for proficient drivers and for aged drivers to determine those behaviors and strategies that are associated with various levels of performance. This insight could be affectively communicated t ....Functional Assessment of Head-eye Coordination during Driving. 238 people per 100,000 population were hospitalized and 9 people per 100,000 died as a result of road-transport related injury in Australia in 2002. We will address this issue by assessing the head eye coordination strategies for young drivers, for proficient drivers and for aged drivers to determine those behaviors and strategies that are associated with various levels of performance. This insight could be affectively communicated to others and would provide the basis for educational material and methods that would improve operator skill, safety, and performance. These individual improvements would provide overall benefits such as improved transport efficiency, reduced accident rates, saved lives and a reduction in related social costs.Read moreRead less
Drivers' Behavioural Responses to Traffic Signs. Traffic signs are ubiquitous in the road environment; research to improve their effectiveness can be very cost-effective in terms of safety improvements. Conducting traffic sign research on real roads has many difficulties, such as ethical considerations and lack of control. To overcome this, the research will be conducted in a driving simulator, in which the interaction between drivers and their equipment/environment will be studied. The aim of ....Drivers' Behavioural Responses to Traffic Signs. Traffic signs are ubiquitous in the road environment; research to improve their effectiveness can be very cost-effective in terms of safety improvements. Conducting traffic sign research on real roads has many difficulties, such as ethical considerations and lack of control. To overcome this, the research will be conducted in a driving simulator, in which the interaction between drivers and their equipment/environment will be studied. The aim of this project is to further understand drivers? behavioural responses to traffic signs, the expected outcome being to make the exchange of information between the driver and traffic sign as smooth and efficient as possible.Read moreRead less