Hazard anticipation of young novice drivers - SWOV

3.2. Hazard anticipation
A hazard is something (a situation, action or object) that can cause adverse
effects. According to Mills et al. (1996), in traffic a hazard is "any aspect of the
road environment or combination of circumstances which exposes an
individual to an increased possibility of an accident". Hazard and risk are not
the same. A risk is the likelihood that a hazard will cause its adverse effects.
This risk can be objective and subjective. Brown & Groeger (1988) used an
objective definition of risk. According to these authors, risk is "the ratio
between some measure of adverse consequences of events and some measure
of exposure to conditions under which those consequences are possible."
Armsby, Boyle & Wright (1989) used a subjective definition of risk. These
authors defined risk as "the level of danger associated with a hazard, as
perceived by the individual". Consider a driver that passes a stationary bus
at a bus stop. This is a hazardous situation, because passengers that have left
the bus may cross the road just in front of the bus. No driver will know the
exact objective risk of this hazard. The probability that a passenger crosses
the road just in front of the bus may be low, but the consequences are
serious. In these situations, drivers probably do not assess the risk but feel
the risk. This is to say, they feel an anticipatory emotion that things may go
wrong (Loewenstein et al., 2001). Drivers that pass the bus without reducing
their speed and without looking just before the edge of the bus in order to
catch a glimpse of a pedestrian that could cross the road as early as possible,
do not show anticipatory actions. They may not have anticipated the possible
pedestrian because they have not recognized the hazard. These drivers do
not expect that pedestrians may cross the road in front of the bus. It may also
be that drivers are vaguely aware of the possibility of a pedestrian who could
cross the road, but they feel no anticipatory emotions that are strong enough
to elicit actions. Finally, it could be that drivers are aware of the risk, but are
of the opinion that pedestrians should obey the rules of the road. If
pedestrians cross the road just in front of the bus, it is their fault. In the first
situation lack of what is mostly named 'hazard perception', is a cognitive
problem (the hazard is not detected and not recognized). In the second
situation, lack of hazard perception is an emotional problem (no or too little
feelings of risk) and in the third situation, not anticipating the hazard, is a
motivational problem (no willingness to take account of road users that do
not obey the rules of the road). Whether young novice drivers predominantly
do not see potential hazards or predominantly do not feel the risks and/or
are not motivated to anticipate hazards is subject of study in Chapter 4.
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