The present report is the final deliverable from Workpackage 1 (“Identification of potential areas of application and research”) of the project PROLOGUE within the EU 7th Framework Programme. The main objective of PROLOGUE is to demonstrate the usefulness, value, and feasibility of conducting a large-scale naturalistic driving observation study in a European context. The report presents a framework for defining research topics and questions that are especially relevant and suitable for being investigated in such a study. The purpose of future research is supposed to be investigation of driver behaviour in relation to safety as well as to environmentally friendly driving and traffic management issues. A similar work being carried out within the US Strategic Highway Research Program 2 (SHRP2) is reviewed and is used as a source of reference for defining research topics. The research topics are defined in terms of combinations of: 1) categories of driving behaviour and driver states, and 2) conditions under which these behaviours may be observed. The matrix resulting from combining these two sets of categories is considered to be a useful framework for classifying and defining more specific research questions for future ND studies. The driver-related categories to be investigated include: distraction and inattention; fatigue, sleepiness and other impairments; decision-making, driving errors, driving style, and general driving performance; lane change and lane position; speed and acceleration; gap acceptance; aggressive driving; learning. The categories of conditions for which they should be studied, include: driver background factors and trip characteristics; road system, road environment, and ambient conditions; vehicle design, equipment, and condition; traffic volume and composition, interaction with other road users. Traffic safety has been the main focus of most previous and ongoing ND research. However, the method is well suited also for investigations of traffic flow and environmentally friendly driving (eco-driving). A user survey showed that “risk taking behaviour” and “crash avoidance behaviour” were the two topics that were considered (very) important by the largest number of respondents. In addition to the thematic research topics, there is a need for methodologically focussed ND studies, including validation of the ND approach itself. (Author/publisher) See http://www.prologue-eu.eu/ for more information and other reports about this programme.
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