Age Effects on Inattentional Blindness Implications for Driving

Age Effects on Inattentional Blindness: Implications for Driving Cary Stothart – University of Notre Dame Walter Boot – Florida State University Daniel Simons - University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign Neil Charness - Florida State University Timothy Wright - University of Massachusetts Amherst Stothart, C. , Boot, W. R. , Simons, D. , Charness, N. , & Wright, T. (2016). Age effects on inattentional blindness: Implications for driving. In J. Zhou, & G. Salvendy (Eds. ). Human Aspects of IT for the Aged Population. Healthy and Active Aging. Paper presented at the International Conference on Human Aspects of IT for the Aged Population, Toronto, 17 -22 July (pp. 441 -448). Switzerland: Springer International Publishing. doi: 10. 1007/978 -3 -319 -39949 -2_42

Inattentional Blindness on the Road • Looked-but-failed-to-see accidents • Distracted driving

Inattentional Blindness and Aging • Older adults are: • More susceptible to inattentional blindness. • More likely to get into a traffic accident. • Are these connected? • Are there factors that moderate the age and inattentional blindness relationship?

Current Study • Predictors of inattentional blindness: • Spatial proximity • Attention set match • Salience • Do these differentially impact older adults’ susceptibility?

Age and Spatial Proximity • Another study found no relationship Paper Stothart, C. , Boot, W. R. , & Simons, D. J. (2015). Using Mechanical Turk to assess the effects of age and spatial proximity on inattentional blindness. Collabra, 1(1), 1 -7. doi: 10. 1525/collabra. 26

Age and Attention Set • No relationship found in previous study (Horwood & Beanland, 2016). • Attended, ignored noticing difference: • Younger adults: 25% • Older adults: 63% • Not significant at. 05. • But, relatively small sample size (n cell = 20).

Age and Salience • No study has looked at this. • Can increasing the salience of road hazards help prevent crashes especially among older adults?

Sample • Recruited and tested online. • N = 618 • Age: • Median = 30 • Minimum = 18 • Maximum = 71

Results • 55% of participants noticed the unexpected object [95% confidence interval: 51%, 59%].

Results • Does age moderate the impact of attention set? • OR = 1. 01 [0. 97, 1. 06] • p =. 650 * Shaded regions are 95% confidence bands

Results • Does age moderate the impact of salience? • OR = 1. 01 [0. 98, 1. 05] • p =. 469 * Shaded regions are 95% confidence bands

Results • Does age moderate the impact of spatial proximity? • OR = 1. 01 [0. 98, 1. 04] • p =. 411 * Shaded regions are 95% confidence bands

Results • Extreme group analysis: • Youngest 25% (n = 156; M = 22. 64, SD = 2. 03, Min = 18, Max = 25) • Oldest 25% (n = 162; M = 49. 72, SD =8. 19, Min = 39, Max = 71)

Results • Does age moderate the impact of attention set? • OR = 1. 39 [0. 31, 6. 79] • p =. 672 * Error bars represent 95% confidence intervals

Results • Does age moderate the impact of salience? • OR = 1. 56 [0. 45, 5. 54] • p =. 484 * Error bars represent 95% confidence intervals

Results • Does age moderate the impact of spatial proximity? • OR = 1. 31 [0. 53, 3. 24] • p =. 564 * Error bars represent 95% confidence intervals

Conclusions • Replicated the age effect on inattentional blindness. • However, this effect is robust to manipulations of: • Attention set • Spatial proximity • Salience • Small number of older than 65+ participants is one limitation.

Thank you!