INCREASING FOLLOWING HEADWAY WITH PROMPTS, GOAL SETTING, AND FEEDBACK IN A DRIVING SIMULATOR

Abstract

We evaluated the effects of prompting, goal setting, and feedback on following headway of young drivers in a simulated driving environment and assessed whether changes produced in following headway were associated with reductions in hard braking when drivers were and were not using cell phones. Participants were 4 university students. During baseline, drivers spent half of the time talking on cell phones while driving. At the start of the intervention, drivers were prompted to increase following headway while on the cell phones and were provided a specific target for following headway. Drivers were given feedback on increasing following headway when on cell phones at the end of each session. The intervention package was associated with an increase in following headway and a decrease in hard braking when participants were on and off the cell phones. Cell phone use did not affect any of the measures.