26 - Cross Modal Effects in Transportation

Abstract

Safe car driving and train driving both depend on operator characteristics. In both tasks, drivers have available a range of auditory and visual clues which can guide their behavior. This paper considers how visual and auditory information are combined in order to facilitate judgments and adjustments of speed and allow train drivers to respond to signals they encounter. For both train and car drivers, this research will demonstrate how important it can be to integrate information across sensory modalities, showing that cross modal effects in transportation are both of considerable theoretical interest, and have profound practical consequences. The research considered two aspects of how drivers might control their speed, or how they might be signalled that a speed change is required. While there are many differences between car and train drivers, questions such as how different sources of information are combined to enable action, and what the relative weightings of different sources of information might be, are important for both.