This paper provides a refresher on the complexity of the driving task by looking at cognitive performance of drivers. The paper discusses a number of psychological theories that relate to the driving task, and gives a number of examples of crashes investigated by TRL to prompt the reader to think of the potential implications of road user distraction. The incidence of looked but failed to see errors is discussed, along with efforts to improve cognitive conspicuity to address this potentially common contributory factor. The distinction between human performance and human behaviour is made and why the former is almost impossible to improve and the latter can be manipulated in many ways is discussed. (a) For the covering record of the conference, please refer to ITRD abstract no E216954.
Samenvatting