ABSTRACT
The Problem. The driving environment is dynamic and rich with critical information to help drivers navigate safely. Timely and appropriate allocation of attention toward this information is paramount, and the relative inexperience of young and new drivers carries implications for how they sample, prioritize, and process available information. Scope of the Chapter. We describe attention allocation in the context of models of supervisory control and highlight the important role of experience (or inexperience) in determining sampling behavior as well as potential attentional failures. We also consider failures of maintenance of attention on the driving task where the driver has elected to divert attention away from the driving task in favor of another task (e.g., driver distraction). Lastly, we discuss briefly visual attention allocation and maintenance in the context of the training approaches aimed at increasing or enhancing driving performance, risk awareness, or attention maintenance on the driving task. Limitations and Recommendations. Given the space constraints, the current chapter is not intended to represent an exhaustive review of the extant literature on visual attention and scanning behaviors of novice and experienced drivers. Rather, we aim to highlight some important theoretical constructs and models and illustrate how they relate to some of the observed experimental findings.
