Ball K, Owsley C, Sloane M E, Roenker D L, Bruni J R
Department of Psychology, Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green 42101.
Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 1993 Oct;34(11):3110-23.
To identify visual factors that are significantly associated with increased vehicle crashes in older drivers.
Several aspects of vision and visual information processing were assessed in 294 drivers aged 55 to 90 years. The sample was stratified with respect to age and crash frequency during the 5-year period before the test date. Variables assessed included eye health status, visual sensory function, the size of the useful field of view, and cognitive status. Crash data were obtained from state records.
The size of the useful field of view, a test of visual attention, had high sensitivity (89%) and specificity (81%) in predicting which older drivers had a history of crash problems. This level of predictability is unprecedented in research on crash risk in older drivers. Older adults with substantial shrinkage in the useful field of view were six times more likely to have incurred one or more crashes in the previous 5-year period. Eye health status, visual sensory function, cognitive status, and chronological age were significantly correlated with crashes, but were relatively poor at discriminating between crash-involved versus crash-free drivers.
This study suggests that policies that restrict driving privileges based solely on age or on common stereotypes of age-related declines in vision and cognition are scientifically unfounded. With the identification of a visual attention measure highly predictive of crash problems in the elderly, this study points to a way in which the suitability of licensure in the older adult population could be based on objective, performance-based criteria.
确定与老年驾驶员交通事故增加显著相关的视觉因素。
对294名年龄在55至90岁的驾驶员的视觉和视觉信息处理的几个方面进行了评估。样本根据年龄和测试日期前5年的事故频率进行分层。评估的变量包括眼睛健康状况、视觉感觉功能、有效视野大小和认知状态。事故数据来自州记录。
有效视野大小，一项视觉注意力测试，在预测哪些老年驾驶员有事故问题历史方面具有高敏感性（89%）和特异性（81%）。这种可预测性水平在老年驾驶员事故风险研究中是前所未有的。有效视野大幅缩小的老年人在过去5年中发生一次或多次事故的可能性高出六倍。眼睛健康状况、视觉感觉功能、认知状态和实际年龄与事故显著相关，但在区分涉及事故与未发生事故的驾驶员方面相对较差。
本研究表明，仅基于年龄或基于与年龄相关的视力和认知下降的常见刻板印象来限制驾驶特权的政策在科学上是没有根据的。通过确定一种对老年人事故问题具有高度预测性的视觉注意力测量方法，本研究指出了一种可以基于客观的、基于表现的标准来确定老年人群体驾驶资格适宜性的方法。
