Heavy-Truck Drivers’ Following Behavior With Intervention of an Integrated, In-Vehicle Crash Warning System

OBJECTIVE: This study is designed to evaluate heavy-truck drivers' following behavior and how a crash warning system influences their headway maintenance. BACKGROUND: Rear-end crashes are one of the major crash types involving heavy trucks and are more likely than other crash types to result in fatalities. Previous studies have observed positive effects of in-vehicle crash warning systems in passenger car drivers. Although heavy-truck drivers are generally more experienced, driver-related errors are still the leading factors contributing to heavy-truck-related rear-end crashes. METHOD: Data from a 10-month naturalistic driving study were used. Participants were 18 professional heavy-truck drivers who received warnings during the last 8 months of the study (treatment period) but not during the first 2 months (baseline period). Time headway and driver's brake reaction time were extracted and compared with condition variables, including one between-subjects variable (driver shift) and five within-subjects variables (treatment condition, roadway types, traffic density, wiper state, and trailer configuration). RESULTS: The presence of warnings resulted in a 0.28-s increase of mean time headway with dense on-road traffic and a 0.20-s increase with wipers on. Drivers also responded to the forward conflicts significantly faster (by 0.26 s, a 15% enhancement) in the treatment condition compared with responses in the baseline condition. CONCLUSION: Positive effects on heavy-truck drivers' following performance were observed with the warning system. APPLICATION: The installation of such in-vehicle crash warning systems can help heavy-truck drivers keep longer headway distances in challenging situations and respond quicker to potential traffic conflicts, therefore possibly increasing heavy-truck longitudinal driving safety.