• Science of Emotion and Sensibility
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• v.27 no.3
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• pp.89-106
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• 2024

Using level-3 automated driving simulation, this study examined the effects of before-after the obstacle avoidance(BOA and AOA, respectively) and driver age group on situation awareness, control transition time, and vehicle control performances.The results can be summarized as follows. First, the situation awareness of the participants was lower in the BOA section compared to the AOA section, and in the older driver group compared to the young driver group, and this tendency was more evident in the BOA section. Second, the control takeover time was significantly slower in the older driver group than in the younger driver group. Third, in all four vehicle control measures, worse performance was observed in the AOA section than in the BOA section, and in the older driver group than in the young driver group, but the difference between age groups in vehicle control performance was larger in the AOA section than in the BOA section. These results suggest that in a situation where the driver takes over control during autonomous driving and avoids obstacles by driving manually, the driver's situational awareness and vehicle control may vary depending on before and after the obstacle avoidance.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.23 no.3
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• pp.71-78
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• 2008

This study aims to identity the age group where driving performance significantly decreases based on the data collected from the Korea Transportation Safety Authority's driver aptitude tests in 2006. The test includes following six driving simulator-based tests: estimation of moving objects' speed, estimation of stopping distance, three tests for drivers' multi-task ability, and kinetic depth perception. These six test results were utilized for the identification of the age threshold applying the CART technique, suggesting driving ability significantly be decreased over 50s. This finding was confirmed by two analyses using the accident history data containing the information of accident and non-accident drivers and the degree of accident severity. The results of this study imply that accident prevention efforts should be enhanced over a wider range of age group than the current practice where the age of 65 is generally applied for the threshold dividing senior and non-senior driver groups.

• Transactions of the Korean Society of Automotive Engineers
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• v.18 no.2
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• pp.104-113
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• 2010

Domestic insurance claims were statistically investigated to analyze the elderly driver's accident patterns and injury types in side impact crashes. Medical treatment records and accident vehicle damage photos have been surveyed for 5,419 cases. The results of our statistical analysis showed that the thorax injury risk of the elderly drive group is 8.8 and 4.0 times higher than that of the young and middle age group respectively. Diagnosis showed that most thorax injuries were caused by rib fracture. The head injury risk of the elderly female driver group seemed to be higher than that of the younger female driver group, however, statistical test has not been conducted because of the lack of number of samples for elderly female accident.

• International Journal of Highway Engineering
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.129-142
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• 2015

PURPOSES : The purpose of this study is to suggest a basis for setting appropriate safety goals specifically related to the threshold zone luminance in a vehicular traffic tunnel. METHODS : In the test, drivers were divided into two groups. One group consisted of all drivers (average drivers) group with an age ratio of drivers holding domestic driver's license and driver group by age to produce threshold zone luminance in the tunnel. The threshold zone luminance produced as a result was used to analyze how it affects the safety level of each driver group and provide a basis for setting an appropriate safety criterion that can be used to determine threshold zone luminance. We used test equipment, test conditions, and ananalysis of threshold zone luminance identical to that reported by ChoandJung(2014) but the values of adaptation luminance in our analys is were expanded to range from100 to $10,000cd/m^2$. RESULTS : Adaptation luminance and threshold zone luminance are found to be related by a quadratic function. The threshold zone luminance needed by older drivers to ensure a certain safety level is significantly higher than that for drivers of other age brackets when adaptation luminance increases. 56% of older drivers are at an increased risk of an accident at the same luminance for which the safety level of average drivers is 75%. The safety level that can be achieved for older drivers increases to above 60% when threshold zone luminance level is set with the goal of attaining a safety level of more than 85% for average drivers. The safety level that can be attained for average drivers is above 90% when the threshold zone luminance is high enough to ensure over 75% in the safety level of older drivers. Results of this study are applicable to highways and others whose designed speed is 100 km/h. CONCLUSIONS : Threshold zone luminance determined on the basis of drivers having average visual ability is of limited value as a performance standard for ensuring the safety of older drivers. Hence, safety level for older drivers should be considered separately from safety levels for drivers with an average ability to avoid risk. Upward adjustment of older drivers' safety level in the process of determining appropriate threshold zone luminance in a vehicular traffic tunnel may bring both tangible and intangible benefit as a result of reducing accidents. However, there is an associated dollar cost arising from installing and operating lights. As a result, the economic impact of these trade-offs should also be considered.

• KSCE Journal of Civil and Environmental Engineering Research
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• v.43 no.4
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• pp.477-484
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• 2023

The number and age of elderly drivers are continuously increasing according to the extension of the human lifespan. Therefore, in transportation, efforts are being made to differentiate and manage elderly drivers by age group. This study aims to identify the factors affecting the crash severity of early and late elderly drivers, compared to middle-aged drivers, and to identify the characteristics between these groups. Crash data that occurred on nationwide roads for the past 5 years (2017-2021) was applied. Unlike previous studies, this study only targeted drivers in their 40s and older, when presbyopia begins: middle-aged driver (40-64), early elderly driver (65-74), and late elderly driver (75+). As a result of logistic regression analysis, a total of 18 variables were found to affect serious injuries including fatalities in early and late elderly drivers. Most of these variables appeared to lead to severity more sensitively in the late elderly group. The results of this study are expected to be useful as basic information for establishing traffic safety policies for elderly drivers in the future.

• Journal of Korean Society of Industrial and Systems Engineering
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• v.21 no.48
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• pp.145-152
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• 1998

Driving performance is characterized by many things such as driver's experience period, age, ability of information processing and reaction time of control devices and so forth. However, each factor of driving performance is needed to help and screen a poor driver for safe driving. In this paper, driving performance was estimated by reaction of manipulating brake, accelerator, steering wheel and speed. Subjects were grouped by experience of accident and age. Combinations of every group were analysed. For all the dependent variables, only steering wheel and speed were shown to have significant difference, which could be regarded as visual information of speed and direction were the important factors to drive safely. Especially for tile elderly, it is needed to enhance their ability of visual information processing that is to be decreased with aging. Therefore driving simulator to train and screen the poor driver should be studied.

• Journal of Preventive Medicine and Public Health
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• v.52 no.6
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• pp.355-365
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• 2019

Objectives: In rural areas of Korea, where public transportation infrastructure is lacking and alternative systems are poor, the elderly experience inconveniences in using healthcare, although their need is high. This study aimed to analyze the association between the convenience of transportation and unmet healthcare needs among the rural elderly. Methods: The data used were collected in the 2016 Community Health Survey among rural elderly individuals aged 65 or older. Dependent variable was the unmet healthcare needs, explanatory variable was the convenience of transportation. The elderly were divided into 3 groups: with no driver in the household, with a driver, and the elderly individual was the driver (the self-driving group). Covariates were classified into predisposing, enabling, and need factors. They included gender, age, education, income, economic activity, household type, motor ability, subjective health level, number of chronic diseases, anxiety/depression, and pain/discomfort. The data were analyzed using logistic regression and stratification. Results: A significant association was found between the convenience of transportation and unmet healthcare needs. When examined unadjusted odds ratio of the group with a driver in the household, using the group with no driver as a reference, was 0.61 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.54 to 0.68), while that of the self-driving group was 0.34 (95% CI, 0.30 to 0.38). The odds ratios adjusted for all factors were 0.69 (95% CI, 0.59 to 0.80) and 0.79 (95% CI, 0.67 to 0.91). Conclusions: We confirmed a significant association between inconvenient transportation and unmet healthcare needs among the rural elderly even after adjustment for existing known factors. This implies that policies aimed at improving healthcare accessibility must consider the means of transportation available.

• International Journal of Highway Engineering
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• v.11 no.2
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• pp.195-203
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• 2009

This research wished to risk type and examine closely driver special quality and relation of traffic accidents by occurrence type of traffic accidents and traffic accidents seriousness examine closely relation with Severity. Fractionate traffic accidents type by eight, and driver's special quality for risk group's classification did to distinction of sex, vehicle type, age etc. analyzed relation with injury degree adding belt used putting on availability for security the objectivity with wave. Used log-Linear model and Logit model for analysis of category data. A head-on collision and overtaking accident, right-turn accident are high injury or death accident and possibility to associate in relation with accident type and seriousness degree. In risk group analysis The age less than 20 years in motor-cycle driver, taxi driver in 41 years to 50 years old are very dangerous. The woman also was construed to the more risk group than man from when related to car, mini-bus, goods vehicle etc. Therefore, traffic safety education and Enforcement for risk group that way that can reduce accident that produce to reduce a loss of lives at traffic accidents appearance a head-on collision and overtaking accidents, right-turn accidents should be studied and as traffic accidents weakness class may have to be solidified.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.23 no.2
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• pp.45-50
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• 2008

The purpose of the present study was to investigate the age difference in driving behavior(more specifically, left-turn). The participants were instructed to report whether they can turn left their car in the T-shape road(road and other vehicles' behavior relating to driver's tasks were recorded in advance and projected the simulation screen) after the leading vehicle passed them(i.e., before the target vehicle arrived). The participants' judgment accuracy and response bias were analyzed by using signal detection theory. The results showed that the old group tended to be less sensitive but more confident in their judgement of turning left their car. In particular, both age groups appeared to more depend on the distance from observation location to approaching vehicle rather than arrival times or driving speeds of the approaching vehicle.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Safety
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• v.21 no.5 s.77
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• pp.103-111
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• 2006

The purpose of this study was to analyse the relationships between cognitive abilities and driving characteristics of elderly drivers. Driving characteristics of elderly and younger drivers who were driving a fixed base driving simulator vehicle were examined. Participants consisted of 12 drivers over age 65 (the 'older' group) and 12 drivers between the ages of 25 and 55 (the "younger" group). As indices of cognitive ability, critical flicker fusion frequency (CFF) tests and cognitive reaction tests were given before the driving task. CFF was also tested after the simulated driving task for both groups. Cognitive reaction tests, which were composed of speed estimation tests, multiple choice reaction tests and obstacle avoidance tests, were developed by the Korean Road Traffic Safety Authority in 2003. CFF values between the two groups exhibited significant differences both before and after the task, with a p-value less than 0.01 and a t-value of -3.01 before the test and a p-value less than 0.031 and a t-value of -2.35 after the test. Older drivers' CFF values were lower than those of the younger. However, there was no difference in older or younger driver CFF values before and after the task within the same group. Except for the multiple choice reaction test, there was no difference in cognitive reaction test results between the two groups. The elderly drivers made more errors though they did not differ from the younger drivers in reaction times. At the simulated driving task the reaction time of the elderly driver was longer than that of the younger; however, the driving speed of the elderly was lower and the number of collisions greater. There was a positive correlation (r=.496) between the number of errors in the multiple choice reaction test and the number of collisions in the driving task. Therefore, it was identified that critical attributes contributing to automobile crashes involving elderly drivers included cognitive difficulty in judging and responding to complex situations.