The influence of light-induced dynamics on attention, perception, and driving behavior

Abstract

During night driving, car headlamps are the most important assistance for the heavily on visual awareness depending driver. New technology aims to provide optimal lighting at all driving situations using adaptive driving beams. These adaptive lighting systems avoid glaring other drivers by adjusting the light beam, while at the same time keeping the rest of the scene highly illuminated. Although a better illuminated field of view is generally associated with higher traf-fic safety, this technology introduces light-induced dynamics caused by the adjustment of the light beam. The effects of this light-induced dynamics on attention, perception and driving be-havior are not understood so far. Using mobile eye tracking during real world night driving we investigated the influence of light-induced dynamics on eye movements. Results of the pilot study showed that light-induced dynamics influenced eye movements and the effect might be stronger for pronounced light-induced dynamics. Further studies will be conducted to investi-gate the influence on visual attention, perception, and driving behavior.