Driving education and technology

By: Drivers.com staff

Date: Wednesday, 27. June 2007

"If we build it, they will buy it."

This statement by Greg Adams, President of Interactive Communications Inc., was made at a recent conference of driver educators at Novi, Michigan. It expressed a feeling some developers of new instructional technologies are beginning to get as they meet the resistance of educators to their ideas. But Adams wasn't referring to educators as the buyers. He was talking about the public.

The implication was that if driver educators are biased against new technologies and slow about embracing their potential for instruction, the public may not be; and maybe the instructional product can be sold directly to the public.

Adams was at the conference demonstrating a prototype computerized interactive driving program designed to improve drivers' abilities to recognize driving hazards. He was somewhat underwhelmed at the response the prototype received, but he was aggressive about the possibilities of this kind of technology for the future. Interactive learning technologies, he argues, can speed up the learning curve, improve comprehension and retention, and compress training times.

Educational software developer John Kernane sees even more powerful effects from instructional technologies during this decade. A few years ago he told instructional computer coordinators in Maryland that "technological learning systems will be a key catalyst in school reform.

"New instructional technologies coming down the pipe will be so powerful, Kernane said, that they will lever fundamental changes in the way education operates."

As CEO of Jostens Learning Corporation, one of the largest players in the educational software field, Kernane is in a good position to see the impact of technology on the future more clearly than the rest of us. And listening to him, one gets the impression that he sees those who drag their feet too much in this department as perhaps having some nasty surprises in store for them as technology takes on a life of its own.

The capability of new technologies to provide individuals with powerful learning experiences that have the same compelling qualities as top entertainment materials will override natural resistance to them, Kernane predicts. The exploding market for CD-ROM technology in the last two years bears testimony to the accuracy of Kernane's perceptions.

However, back in the driver ed classroom, life tends to go on as usual. Talk about virtual reality, the information superhighway, interactive TV and multimedia computerized learning systems seems fantastic, but it has to be measured against all the hype about the marvels of technology that we've been regaled with recently.

Technologies haven't always fulfilled their promises, and changes are occurring so rapidly, and the hype is at times so intense, that there's little to do except sit back and see how it all turns out.

Driver education expert and Responsible Driving co-author Dr. Frank Kenel feels that the new interactive multimedia technologies have quite a way to go before they have practical value for instructors. This is coming, he says, but probably not in the next five to ten years. One of the major problems, Kenel feels, is that there is still little consensus on the details of the driving task and about what works and what doesn't in producing safer drivers.

"Consensus," he says, "implies that we should have it all sorted out and then give it to the student-without much discussion about pros and cons-but right now we don't even have consensus about how to sit in a car."

When interactive technologies are ready to play a role, Kenel sees a need for the instructor to become a facilitator rather than a teacher. Instructors will have to be more knowledgeable, he says, and be technically literate about the machines they're using.

With the technologies will come the capability to deal with each driver's particular learning needs, says Kenel, and this will mean a more diverse range of instructional services. This sentiment is echoed by driver education technology consultant John Svensson. Svensson feels that the new instructional technologies are best applied to specific situations and individuals rather than to broad populations.

All these new technologies need to be validated by research into their effectiveness and their effects, says Svensson, and he points in particular to technologies now being introduced to aid drivers in carrying out the driving task.

"In the vehicle," he says, "we have radios, car phones, the G-Analyst, onboard computers, antilock braking systems (ABS), and a variety of navigation systems. Most of these technologies have not been validated. There is no concrete evidence that they improve driver performance in terms of safety or efficiency."

In the case of ABS, some disturbing evidence that there might even be a negative effect on safety is beginning to emerge. Once hailed as a major advance in crash prevention, ABS is now seen as presenting a new challenge to the training/education community. Studies in Germany, Canada and France have shown that drivers with ABS tend to drive faster and take more risks.

As well, researchers concluded that many drivers need instruction in the use of ABS. For example, they tend to use the same braking methods in avoidance situations that they used with non-antilock brakes-attempting to threshold brake, or pumping the brake pedal and failing to activate the ABS.

New technologies

Other technologies coming down the pipe may present challenges to the training/education community as well. Dr. Quinn Brackett, of Texas A & M University, has taken a special interest in technologies such as external-mounted changeable message signs about route information, as well as some in-vehicle displays being tested that also have to do with navigation, but go a step further and attempt to improve the crash avoidance capability of the driver.

These devices, Brackett says, have the potential to help the driver, but they also place on drivers a heavy burden of fairly sophisticated decision-making which they may have difficulty in handling. As in the case of ABS, these new technologies will likely require the development of special instructional and educational services to help drivers take advantage of their potential, Brackett feels.

Driving simulators are an interactive technology that's been with us since the 1950s. During the '70s and '80s they seemed to lose favour with many educators but now they're being mentioned with increasing frequency with reference to their potential in dealing with specific training problems.

The fully interactive simulator now being marketed to police forces by AGC Simulation Products puts drivers at the controls of a machine that responds like a real car. And trainees can be presented with the task of driving on a roadway at speed while simultaneously managing communications with a dispatcher and responding to traffic.

The computer graphic roadway may even have traffic that reacts to the trainee's actions. For example it might be other trainees driving police cars involved in the same pursuit action.

While interactive technologies are gaining increasing attention with reference to safety-related elements of the driving task such as hazard recognition and situational responses, the driver training community seems to have a general consensus that "bums in seats" and the feel of a real car won't be replaced by technology in the foreseeable future.

However, technology is moving rapidly and some of the possibilities are mind boggling. The states of California and Oregon are testing the use of the AGC simulator to replace part of the driving road test, or at least to screen drivers before they go on the road. Home instructional programs are already available for some parts of the driving task, and ideas for the future include kiosk-like driving centers at shopping malls that test driver license applicants and dispense learner permits on the spot.

At the very least, those involved in the training and education of drivers should be "aiming high" and keeping an informed eye on these futuristic developments as they unfold. Otherwise, as Greg Adams suggests, they may simply be left out of the picture by a public that is being catered to directly by the technology developers.

In other, more blunt terms, perhaps the choice that the driver education community may face in the future is whether it wants a supporting role as technology caters directly to the public, or a central role in which it enlists technology as a powerful ally in achieving its goals.

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