Visuo-attentional abilities of elderly drivers: Development of an evaluation tool
GABAUDE ; PAUZIE
Type de document
COMMUNICATION AVEC ACTES INTERNATIONAL (ACTI)
Langue
anglais
Auteur
GABAUDE ; PAUZIE
Résumé / Abstract
Authorities are considering to set up drivers evaluation abilities processes, and to harmonise them at a european level. In this framework, it is necessary to overview the existing criteria in this area, and to define their interest, their limits and their relevancy according to the driving task demand. Moreover, the widespread use of computers and multimedia software constitute a new opportunity concerning the development of measurement devices for the performance evaluation of complex visual tasks. In this context, a set of visuo-attentionnal tests ( tevic) specific to the driving activity has been developed. The development made focused on the evaluation of drivers visuo-attentional abilities. Visual investigation includes static and dynamic acuity, colour and contrast vision, according to two levels of background luminance. Perceptive functions were explored with an innovative test based upon numeric video road sequences, in order to observe the detection performance of static and moving stimuli such as pedestrians, dogs and balls on a realistic road background. One part of this test allowed to evaluate attentional aspects by including a visual tracking task, in addition to the detection task. A sample of 40 drivers (20 young and 20 elderly) carried out the two tests. Results obtained for the visual exploration were compared to the one using a classical visual tester. Results indicate that this tool allowed to better investigate visual and attentional characteristics of drivers, in a closer way than ophthalmologic tests do for the driving task. And, moreover, according to people tested by tevic, this new tool facilitates their awareness of some of their functional deficiencies.
