Effects of driving experience and hazard type on young drivers’ hazard perception

Abstract

Young novice drivers are found to be poor at detecting and responding to hazards on the road. In this study, three groups of young drivers with 6, 12 and 18 month driving experience were asked to complete a hazard perception task and their eye movements were recorded using Tobbi T120 eye tracker. The task contained 20 video clips, and hazards in the clips were classified into overt hazard (continuous visibility) and covert hazard (interrupted visibility) according to their visibility of materialization. Results revealed that drivers reacted to overt hazards faster than covert hazards. The experience-related differences in reaction time of the three driver groups were due to the faster processing after the initial fixation. Drivers’ mean fixation duration was influenced by hazard type, but not by driving experience. These findings suggested that hazard type was a key factor when it comes to hazard perception testing and training for young drivers.