Intelligent Vehicle Lighting: Impacts on Visual Perception of Drivers Varying in Age

Transportation safety agencies are working to consider how to best incorporate the potential safety benefits of intelligent vehicle lighting systems such as adaptive driving beam headlights and other systems on vehicles used by the general public. As these deliberations continue, additional data on the impacts of lighting technological developments are important to generate and share. An analytical study was performed to assess how different vehicle lighting configurations including ADB and other technologies can assist drivers in achieving visual acquisition of potential hazards along the road. The investigation also compared drivers varying in age and whose visual performance differs because of optical changes in the visual system. The importance of considering visibility for older drivers is critical because this group is an increasingly large proportion of the overall driving population. Analyses use the relative visual performance (RVP) model, a predictive system for ascertaining the speed and accuracy of visual processing, which has been validated in a number of field studies of driving and visual response. The results can be used to identify some of the potential benefits of intelligent vehicle lighting on visual perception.