Citation

Demirarslan H, Chan Y, Vidulich M. Transp. Res. Rec. 1998; 1631: 35-42.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1998, Transportation Research Board, National Research Council, National Academy of Sciences USA, Publisher SAGE Publishing)

DOI

10.3141/1631-06

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

In performing critical tasks, the reaction time of the decision maker may mean the difference between safety and hazard. While different people have different risk-taking behavior, the process by which they react to a stimulus is fundamentally similar. The process involves perception, decision, and response. Thus, the decision maker sees an outside stimulus, processes the information and arrives at a yes or no decision, and then takes the necessary physical steps to implement the decision. For example, a driver sees the onset of a yellow light, makes up his or her mind about stopping or running for the light, and accordingly steps on the brake or the gas pedal. We refer to perception, decision, and response as the fundamental "triplet" underlying any human performance in a simple or complex environment. Unless this triplet is understood, other behavioral models cannot be constructed with confidence. By observing the percentage of drivers that run for a light and stop for a light, the authors have shown that one can separately measure the perception, decision, and response times in terms of probability distributions. The proposed approach is illustrated for drivers at an intersection through a series of experiments. Preliminary results point to its applicability toward other human tasks, such as landing an aircraft.

Language: en