Phase II, Study 3 was part of the Enhanced Night Visibility project, a larger research effort investigating drivers’ visual performance during nighttime driving. Study 3 helped expand the knowledge of how current vision enhancement systems can affect detection and recognition of different types of objects during adverse weather, specifically for snow conditions. A total of 20 participants detected and recognized different roadway objects while driving experimental vehicles equipped with various headlamps in a snow condition. A 4 by 3 by 2 mixed factorial design was used to investigate the effects of the different types of vision enhancement systems, the types of objects on the roadway, and driver’s age on detection and recognition distances. Subjective evaluations for the different systems were obtained as well. The results of the empirical testing suggest that halogen low beam (HLB) configurations combined with an ultraviolet A (UV–A) setup consistently outperform the HLB by itself and the high intensity discharge (HID) configuration with respect to detecting and recognizing pedestrians in a snow environment. All three HLB configurations significantly outperformed the HID configuration for both detection and recognition of the objects presented. The three HLB configurations were not significantly different from each other with respect to recognition distances; however, there was a slight but significant increase in detection distance when the HLB was paired with one of the UV–A systems used. Finally, there were no significant findings for the subjective analysis, although there were some conflicting findings between the subjective and objective data. (Author/publisher)
Abstract