title: The conspicuity of pedestrians at night: a review.
abstract: Drivers' visual limitations are a leading contributor to night-time traffic crashes involving pedestrians. This paper reviews the basic changes in vision that occur at night for young and old visually healthy drivers, as well as those with common ocular pathology. To maximise their safety at night, pedestrians should be conspicuous. That is, beyond being simply visible (detectable as an ambiguous object), they should attract the attention of drivers and be readily perceivable as pedestrians. Research has established that the conspicuity of pedestrians can be optimised by attaching retroreflective markings to the pedestrian's extremities. Doing so highlights the pedestrian's 'biological motion,' which facilitates the accurate perception of a person; however, retroreflective markings on the torso (for example, vests) are less effective. Importantly, behavioural evidence indicates that most road users - drivers and pedestrians alike - are not aware of the limitations of night vision. For example, drivers typically 'overdrive' the useful range of their headlight beams and under-use their high beam headlight setting. Further, pedestrians overestimate their own conspicuity at night and fail to appreciate the extent to which their own conspicuity depends on their clothing. The widespread misunderstanding of the challenges associated with night driving reflects a lack of awareness of the fundamental limitations of night vision. Educational interventions are needed to ameliorate these dangerous misunderstandings and to improve the safety of all road users at night.
authors: Department of Psychology, Clemson University, Clemson, South Carolina, USA. tyrrell@clemson.edu.
authors: Richard A
authors: RA
authors: Tyrrell
authors: School of Optometry and Vision Science, Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.
authors: Joanne M
authors: JM
authors: Wood
authors: Whitely Psychology Laboratories, Franklin & Marshall College, Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA.
authors: D Alfred
authors: DA
authors: Owens
authors: Applied Building Sciences, Inc, Charleston, South Carolina, USA.
authors: Stephanie
authors: S
authors: Whetsel Borzendowski
authors: Turner-Fairbank Highway Research Center, McLean, Virginia, USA.
authors: Ashley
authors: A
authors: Stafford Sewall
mesh_terms: D000063:Accidents, Traffic / Q000517:prevention & control*; D000375:Aging / Q000502:physiology; D001334:Automobile Driving; D003624:Darkness; D006801:Humans; D008029:Lighting; D000069636:Pedestrians; D012449:Safety; D014786:Vision Disorders / Q000503:physiopathology; D014785:Vision, Ocular
keywords: driver's vision; night driving; pedestrians