Components of driving skill: experience does not mean expertise

Abstract

Using an instrumented car driven in normal traffic, we assessed the driving skills of trained experts, of normal, experienced drivers, and of novices. Previous research suggests a fairly simple picture of improvement in driving skills with experience, and for aspects of car control (e.g., steering path, speed of manoeuvres) our results confirm this: normals largely resembled experts, while novices performed more poorly. There are reasons to suspect, however, that experience may not always be so beneficial. For example, one important variable may be feedback, or information indicating to the driver that a particular action is or is not important in terms of overall goals (progress, safety, etc.). Where feedback is good, simple experience may bring expertise, but where feedback is poor, skills may fail to improve or even deteriorate once explicit tuition is removed. Correspondingly, our findings showed that for scanning patterns (e.g., mirror checking), anticipation (e.g., braking into an intersection), and safety margin (e.g., close following on the motorway), it was often the normal, experienced drivers who performed worst, novices sometimes even resembling experts. The data make it clear that for many aspects of driving skill experience is no guarantee of expertise.