Assisting the older driver - SWOV

Assisting the older driver
Road characteristics that may conflict with experience:
1) road that has right of way is also intuitively the most important road
(yes/no); 2) estimated average speed of motor vehicles driving on the main
road of the intersection as compared to the speed limit (low, normal, high).
The intersection’s user profile:
1) number of motor vehicles passing the main road of the intersection within
15 minutes of time (also mentioned at time pressure); 2) estimated average
speed of motor vehicles driving on the main road of the intersection as
compared to the speed limit (also mentioned at experience); 3) composition of
road users in terms of transport mode (normal, many cyclists and/or
pedestrians, many heavy goods vehicles; lots of public transportation (buses,
trams) and pedestrians); 4) composition of road users in terms of age
(percentage of older road users is: less than average, average, more than
average).
Characteristics of the environment:
1) percentage of the population of the neighbourhood being 65 years old or
older (Statistics Netherlands, 1999); 2) retirement home or hospital in the
neighbourhood (yes/no); 3) the intersection is part of a route that leads to a
popular destination such as the market, shops, the beach, or an amusement
park (yes/no); 4) description of the immediate surroundings of the
intersection and its crossing streets (residential area, shopping area, woody
surroundings).
Data‐analysis
To examine whether the road characteristics that were expected to raise task
difficulty were indeed more prevalent at the intersections belonging to Intold
than at the intersections belonging to Intyoung, their occurrence was compared
by calculating frequencies for every coded variable. For those variables for
which frequencies appeared to differ between Intold and Intyoung, differences
were tested by calculating either an independent‐samples t‐test or Pearson’s
Chi‐square.
5.2.3. Results
When visiting the selected intersections, 6 of the 30 selected intersections
turned out to be under reconstruction or were otherwise not being used in
the way they would have been in the period between 1990 and 2000 (e.g.,
because of a temporary detour, or an earlier reconstruction of the
intersection). Twenty‐four intersections remained, 13 intersections belonging
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