Background and aims:
Traffic safety has been influenced by mobile phone induced distraction
while driving and related car crashes. The effects of audio-verbal tasks on driving performances like
break reaction time, hazard detection time and deviation from lane have been studied by many
researchers. But driver’s audio-verbal performance in has not received more attention. The effect of
driving task on conversation task and vice versa can be determined by evaluating conversation
performance and can explain how drivers prioritize two tasks.
Methods:
In this experimental study remembering of negative and positive words by 52 young (23
t0 35 years old) male participants while driving a simulator was examined.
Results:
Results revealed that Short-Term Memory (STM) performance is influenced by difficulty
level of audio task and road type. The Wilcoxon test for nonparametric paired data showed that
mean rank for remembered words in two-way roads is greater than one way roads and this
difference is statistically significant. Also this test has performed for considering the effect of
word’s semantic content on STM performance and showed that there is no statistically significant
difference between remembered positive words and negative ones. Negative and significant
correlation found between age and driving experience with remembering words
Conclusion:
These findings shows that driver’s STM performance while driving is related to limited
capacity of short-term memory in one hand and is influenced by driving circumstances like speed
and road type on the other hand. More studies have suggested determining the effect of semantic
content of auditory task on STM performance while driving.
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