The broad application of LEDs for automotive lighting purposes, together with new discoveries in vision physiology, is creating new challenges in the field of glare perception. The purpose of this study was to link subjective and objective measures of driver-perceived glare following different light sources used in car headlamps. In order to achieve this, a combination of subjective evaluation using an adapted version of the de Boer scale and objective measures based on psychophysiological data was applied. Predominantly, skin conductance response (SCR), heart rate variability (HRV), and eye-blinking frequency (vertical electrooculography, vEOG) were recorded. Though there was some evidence suggesting lower discomfort with glare from light sources with a lower correlated color temperature, the results were generally inconclusive. This illustrates the urgent need to study the linkage between light source properties and subjective and objective glare measures in deeper detail, so that the technical norms governing car headlamps can reflect the needs of human physiology and psychophysiology.

Worldwide, road-users complain about glare from oncoming cars’ headlights, often blaming new light sources such as light-emitting diodes (LEDs). However, drivers’ own behavior and attitudes might contribute to the issue of glare. The aim of this research was to establish the prevalence of on-road glare and its associations with drivers’ attitudes in a sample of Czech drivers. We used an online survey and gained responses from 539 passenger-car-drivers. The majority experienced glare at least once a week or almost daily, identifying mainly white- or bluish-colored headlights as the source of glare. However, about 60% of participants would prefer the view of the road that is provided by these sources, and an association was found between the preferred part of the lighting color spectrum and the perceived glare source color. A large proportion of drivers were also not aware of the specifics of the lighting sources that they used. These findings suggest the need for driver education in the area of automotive lighting and glare prevention.

In order to determine whether an experimentally induced experience has the potential to change future travel mode choice, we recruited 10 families living in a middle-sized city who used a car at least four times a week, and made them stop using the car for one month. Each adult family member kept a travel diary and interviews were conducted prior to the experiment, after one month without a car, and then three months and one year after the experiment ended. The results suggest that the participants’ attitudes towards different transportation modes did not change during the period of the study, but their actual travel behavior did. In this respect, several factors were identified that influence travel mode choice, once the participants are made aware of the decision process and break the habit of car use.

Background: There is agreement that road user behaviour is the most important contributing factor for traffic accidents. It is therefore essential to understand better the causes of accidents and design remedies that can efficiently treat them. The fatality rate per 10,000 people is about 30 times higher in developing countries than in high-income countries These differences, beside other factors, can be explained in terms of different traffic safety cultures.