IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v13y2021i8p4419-d536831.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Safety Analysis of Young Pedestrian Behavior at Signalized Intersections: An Eye-Tracking Study

Author

Listed:
  • Chiara Gruden

    (Faculty of Civil Engineering, Transportation Engineering and Architecture, University of Maribor, 2000 Maribor, Slovenia)

  • Irena Ištoka Otković

    (Faculty of Civil Engineering and Architecture Osijek, Josip Juraj Strossmayer University of Osijek, 31000 Osijek, Croatia)

  • Matjaž Šraml

    (Faculty of Civil Engineering, Transportation Engineering and Architecture, University of Maribor, 2000 Maribor, Slovenia)

Abstract

Smartphones have become an integral part of our everyday lives and keep us busy while doing other primary activities such as driving, cycling or walking in traffic. The problem of digital distraction among drivers has been largely addressed, and interest is growing also on vulnerable road users as well. In fact, high percentages of pedestrians and cyclists are accustomed to checking their devices while moving in traffic. This research links to the presented theme and aims to investigate the extent to which digital distraction in the form of social media app checking influences pedestrian behavior. The focus of the study is specifically on signalized intersections. An outdoor, eye-tracking experiment was conducted on a specific route consisting of various elements typical of urban areas. Participants were asked to walk the predefined route twice, encountering three signalized intersections: the first time they were asked to walk with their smartphone in hand, the second time without. The recordings of each participant’s route were then analyzed, examining reaction time, crossing time and speed, fixations and gaze paths. The results show a clear impact of digital devices on pedestrians’ attention by increasing their reaction and crossing times and decreasing crossing speeds. In addition, the analysis of fixations found that 82.54% of the time was devoted to the smartphone, while interest in other street elements decreased from 16.64% to 4.03%.

Suggested Citation

  • Chiara Gruden & Irena Ištoka Otković & Matjaž Šraml, 2021. "Safety Analysis of Young Pedestrian Behavior at Signalized Intersections: An Eye-Tracking Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(8), pages 1-16, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:8:p:4419-:d:536831
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/8/4419/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/8/4419/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Irena Ištoka Otković & Aleksandra Deluka-Tibljaš & Sanja Šurdonja & Tiziana Campisi, 2021. "Development of Models for Children—Pedestrian Crossing Speed at Signalized Crosswalks," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-18, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Fu Guo & Wei Lyu & Zenggen Ren & Mingming Li & Ziming Liu, 2022. "A Video-Based, Eye-Tracking Study to Investigate the Effect of eHMI Modalities and Locations on Pedestrian–Automated Vehicle Interaction," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(9), pages 1-21, May.
    2. Chiara Gruden & Irena Ištoka Otković & Matjaž Šraml, 2022. "An Eye-Tracking Study on the Effect of Different Signalized Intersection Typologies on Pedestrian Performance," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-19, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Malik Sarmad Riaz & Ariane Cuenen & Evelien Polders & Muhammad Bilal Akram & Moustafa Houda & Davy Janssens & Marc Azab, 2022. "Child Pedestrian Safety: Study of Street-Crossing Behaviour of Primary School Children with Adult Supervision," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(3), pages 1-15, January.
    2. Marie-Soleil Cloutier & Mojgan Rafiei & Lambert Desrosiers-Gaudette & Zeinab AliYas, 2022. "An Examination of Child Pedestrian Rule Compliance at Crosswalks around Parks in Montreal, Canada," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(21), pages 1-17, October.
    3. Irena Ištoka Otković & Barbara Karleuša & Aleksandra Deluka-Tibljaš & Sanja Šurdonja & Mario Marušić, 2021. "Combining Traffic Microsimulation Modeling and Multi-Criteria Analysis for Sustainable Spatial-Traffic Planning," Land, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-26, June.
    4. Li, Weigang & Liu, Jian, 2023. "Analysis of the evolution of pedestrian crossing based on dynamic penalty mechanism," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 623(C).
    5. Piotr Szagała & Piotr Olszewski & Witold Czajewski & Paweł Dąbkowski, 2021. "Active Signage of Pedestrian Crossings as a Tool in Road Safety Management," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(16), pages 1-13, August.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:13:y:2021:i:8:p:4419-:d:536831. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.