The Possible Effects of Commercial Electronic Variable Message Signs (CEVMS) on Driving Safety - Phase 1
5.0 Future Research Program
As stated previously, it is not possible to answer all of the critical questions concerning possible attention, distraction, and safety impacts from CEVMS in a single experiment. Instead, a carefully crafted program of research needs to be conceived and implemented to embrace a series of interrelated experiments and studies directed at answering different facets of this complex issue. This section describes the important elements of a recommended research program. This research program is broadly defined to provide a background and context for more concrete alternative first stage studies outlined in section 6.0. This section describes a long-range multistudy research program covering a number of years. Section 6.0 will outline three methods for implementing the first stage of that program.
5.1 Stages
The proposed research program would have the following three stages:
Stage 1 - The attention and distraction effects of CEVMS would be investigated to determine whether any observed or measured distractions due to CEVMS is sufficient to interfere with attentional criteria for safe driving. This stage is directed at discovering whether or not distraction from CEVMS represents a potential driving hazard. Initial CEVMS parameters must be chosen carefully so as not to bias the result from the outset.
Stage 2 - If potential interfering distraction is observed, it would be necessary to investigate the relationship between the observed distraction and various CEVMS parameters (e.g., luminance, change rate, distance, CEVMS spacing, engagement level of sign content, and road geometry) to determine possible limitations on CEVMS deployment and operation which might reduce distraction to noninterfering levels. This stage is directed at developing empirical data to support the development of possible restrictions or regulation of CEVMS to reduce potential driving hazards.
Stage 3 - As related to CEVMS, researchers would have to investigate the relationship between distraction, defined in terms of eye glance behavior and safety surrogate measures (driving conflicts, errors, etc.), and safety, defined more directly in terms of crashes, fatalities, injuries, and property damage. This stage focuses on validating the eye glance and safety surrogate measures used to infer attention and distraction effects of CEVMS through the primary safety criterion of protecting life, health, and property.
The above stages of the proposed research program are to be pursued sequentially. The initial stage is directed at determining whether or not a potentially harmful CEVMS distraction effect exists. To demonstrate such a distraction effect, an independent and objective threshold criterion of excessive distraction must be employed. If no potentially harmful distraction is shown, at least as far as driving safety is concerned, there would be little need to pursue the second stage of developing a basis for regulating CEVMS or the third stage of relating CEVMS distraction to more direct measures of safety (crashes). If potentially harmful distraction is shown in the first stage, the second and third stages would be implemented in order. The order of the last two stages may appear to be reversed. Normally, it would seem desirable to establish a relationship between CEVMS distraction and crashes before developing a basis for regulation. However, in this instance, the LED-based digital CEVMS technology is so new that it will not be possible to reliably measure crashes for some time. Meanwhile, if possible distraction is shown, the community of practitioners engaged in outdoor advertising control will need near-term technical information on the luminance, contrast, change rates, and spacing of CEVMS to minimize that distraction. For this reason, the stages have been proposed in the order given above.
5.2 Approach
The literature review update in section 2.0 points to some important principles that should be incorporated into the proposed program of research to enhance the probability that the program can successfully achieve its goals. These principles can be regarded as lessons learned from the experience of previous research. First, empirical studies should employ CEVMS stimuli, as well as a variety of comparison stimuli, including standard (non-digital) billboards, built objects of casual visual interest (e.g., houses, barns), and natural background control scenery (e.g., trees, fields). This principle establishes a relevant visual context against which to contrast CEVMS stimuli. Next, empirical studies should be constructed so as to compare the effects of CEVMS and the effects of the various comparison stimuli. This principle implies that some measurable (statistically significant) effect should be demonstrated for as many of the comparison stimuli as possible, at least for the standard billboards. It is necessary to show some distraction effect for both CEVMS and standard billboards relative to a baseline to be sure that the study is not just measuring random noise in the data. In addition, for the case of distraction and safety surrogate performance measures, the measured effects of CEVMS and standard billboards need to be compared with each other and with an independently determined criterion of potentially harmful consequences. The application of this criterion needs to incorporate the concept of self-regulated attention, as indicated in section 3.0. Last, to the degree possible, direct experimental control should be exerted over the CEVMS stimuli. In the first stage of determining a meaningful distraction effect, this control can be limited to turning the CEVMS on and off for predetermined periods according to a strict experimental protocol. In the second stage of establishing possible parameter limitations, this control may need to be expanded to changing the luminance, message change rate, or some other CEVMS characteristic according to an experimental protocol.
These four principles define the basic approach for implementing the proposed research program. They provide guidance and direction to the proposed program. It should be emphasized that only a systematic multiyear broad program of research can adequately answer the important questions posed by the community interested in outdoor advertising control concerning the possible distraction effects and safety implications of CEVMS. No single experiment can provide the solution. It should also be emphasized that all stages of the research program must be sensitive to the practical needs of the outdoor advertising community, which includes highway engineers, traffic engineers, the outdoor advertising industry, environmental advocates, and outdoor advertising regulators. Even though the second stage is where most of these practical needs are addressed, at all stages of the research, investigators need to try to provide practical information on the luminance, contrast, change rate, display size, display spacing, or other parameters over which the outdoor advertising community could possibly exert some control. Administrators concerned with issuing permits for billboards need practical engineering results to assist them in there daily jobs.
5.3 Structure
As outlined above, the proposed research program consists of three stages. The first stage focuses on determining the potential existence of harmful distraction effects due to CEVMS. The second stage involves determining limitations or restrictions to CEVMS parameters which could reduce or eliminate the implied potentially harmful distracting effects. The third stage focuses on relating the reduction in implied potentially harmful distraction to actual safety benefits of decreasing crashes, fatalities, injuries, and property damage on the roadway. The sections below describe these stages in more detail.
5.3.1 Stage 1 - Determination of Distraction
The first stage, to determine the potential existence of harmful CEVMS distraction, may be implemented in many different ways. According to the analysis of research strategies in
section 4.0, the three most effective approaches are the on-road instrumented vehicle, the naturalistic driving, and the unobtrusive observation methods.
The on-road instrumented vehicle method is sensitive to a wide range of variables, including accurate eye glance measurements. It affords the opportunity to ensure that the test participants drive by many CEVMS and comparison sites in a structured and reproducible manner.
The naturalistic driving method is similar to the on-road instrumented vehicle technique, but it has less control since the test participants drive their own vehicles according to their own personal daily schedules. As a result, the participants may pass few, if any, billboards. Furthermore, the naturalistic driving method has difficulty supporting accurate eye glance measurements, and it requires considerably more effort and expense. However, the naturalistic driving method is less artificial and has a high degree of face validity.
Although the unobtrusive observation method also involves considerable effort and expense, the data collected are based on the observation of vehicles rather than individual drivers. The unobtrusive observation method is the least artificial of the three because with this technique, research participants are generally unaware of being observed.
This first stage of the research program would employ one or more of these study approaches as a first step. A single method could be selected, or more than one approach could be combined. For example, the on-road instrumented vehicle and the unobtrusive observation method could make an effective combination, but the cost would be high. In either case, this first stage should also be designed to answer, at least in a preliminary manner to whatever degree possible, some of the practical questions of interest to the community concerned with outdoor advertising control.
5.3.2 Stage 2 - Basis for Regulation
If the results of the first stage reveal a CEVMS driver distraction effect sufficient for public concern, then the second stage of the proposed research program would be implemented to provide an initial technical basis for possible regulation. This stage would consist of a series of eye glance and safety surrogate evaluations in the field and in the laboratory designed to investigate the various parameters of CEVMS which contribute to driver distraction. Although field methods can capture the realism of the CEVMS stimulus, they do not allow the researcher to independently vary a variety of CEVMS parameters one at a time so as to isolate the effect of that variable, as some of the laboratory techniques would. For example, this second stage might begin with attempts to estimate the gross effects of certain salient CEVMS parameters in the field. Throughout this section, the brightness of the CEVMS will be used as an example, but the approach can be adapted to many other relevant CEVMS characteristics. For example, many current CEVMS displays adjust their brightness for day and night. If the outdoor advertising industry would agree to adjust the brightness of several installations both during the day and at night for the purposes of experimentation, partial estimates of the effects of brightness on eye glance behavior might be elaborated for selected luminance levels.
To obtain a more complete functional relationship between eye glance distraction and CEVMS luminance, a test track or driving simulator experiment might be devised. If it were possible to erect an experimental CEVMS installation at a test track location, the test track experiment would have realistic brightness and contrast levels, as well as controlled exposure conditions. However, it would suffer from a highly constrained and unnatural driving environment. The driving simulator experiment could easily portray a wide variety of driving environments with realistic contexts, but it would suffer from a severely restricted range of luminance and contrast ratios. Nonetheless, to overcome these disadvantages, correction factors or transformations might be applied to the test track data to account for discrepancies in level of attention and to the driving simulator data to account for photometric discrepancies. The incorporation of such correction factors or transformations to relate test track and laboratory data to driving data on real roads underscores the necessity of conducting a combination of field and laboratory testing environments in this stage of the proposed research program. Some degree of field validation needs to be a part of any laboratory component of the research during this stage.
This second stage of the research program must be designed to answer, to the degree possible, the practical questions of the community interested in outdoor advertising control. This is the stage of research which addresses functional relationships regarding the effects of CEVMS luminance (brightness), change rates, size, display spacing, and other variables on driver distraction and roadway safety. These functional relationships could subsequently be translated by outdoor advertising administrators and regulators into concrete rules which protect the safety of the driving public while at the same time allowing commercial growth and the rights of the outdoor advertising industry. To be fully successful, this stage of the research program must be pursued with active participation from all stakeholders, which include industry, environmentalists, researchers, and regulators alike.
5.3.3 Stage 3 - Relationship to Crashes
The third stage of the proposed research program relates changes in potentially harmful distraction effects due to various CEVMS parameters to changes in actual roadway safety (crashes and their consequent fatalities, injuries, and property damage). This stage is directed at validating the earlier findings with regard to CEVMS distraction based on eye glance and safety surrogate measures in the context of retrospective crash data. This stage of the program would likely employ the Empirical Bayes, or Bayesian, method of analyzing crash statistics. The Bayesian approach formally incorporates prior knowledge into the process of current research, and it translates probabilistic calculations into statements of belief concerning statistical hypotheses in place of the classical confidence interval concept employed in parametric statistics. The Empirical Bayes method also incorporates the crash history of other control sites with similar traits to account for extraneous factors which may be influencing the crash data at the site of interest. In short, the Empirical Bayes method possesses distinct statistical advantages over the naïve before/after technique and even the before/after technique with a simple control. The Empirical Bayes method is well suited for the task of estimating vehicle crash rates along different stretches of roadway, including those stretches with CEVMS. The prediction of baseline crash rates, and their potential increase or decrease with the introduction of CEVMS, is essential to this final stage of the proposed research program. This final stage should also be designed to answer, to whatever degree possible based on crash statistics, some of the practical questions of interest to the community concerned with outdoor advertising control. Because of the low numbers of crashes and their susceptibility to multiple determining causes, considerable effort, time, and expense will likely have to be expended on this final stage.To provide Feedback, Suggestions or Comments for this page contact Catherine A. O'Hara (catherine.o'hara@dot.gov).
