Caution Behavior and its Conditioning in Driving

Abstract

If people drove more cautiously, there might be fewer accidents. Caution behavior includes pausing and looking. It is suggested that the “precautionary pause” based on a longer response latency and reduced force can be conditioned into drivers as avoidance behavior. In laboratory research that can be construed as simulation of driving, latencies were lengthened and forces diminished because of the contingencies of an aversive consequence. Accidents, near-accidents, and verbalizations about them can be viewed as aversive consequences that generate driver avoidance behavior, including the precautionary pause. How might the driving environment, including motivational signs, be designed to exploit this process and thereby contribute to highway safety?