Distraction and workload: driving on the A10 ring road around

A simulator study was performed to establish the effects of motorway environment complexity on driver distraction and workload. In this study environment complexity refers to the visual complexity of static objects on or next to the road and in its vicinity (e.g. traffic signs, buildings, advertisements…). It does not include traffic density or traffic state. It was hypothesized that a complex road environment attracts attention of the driver more than a simple environment and therefore leads to a higher driver workload. We compared two situations that represented the extremes regarding environment complexity (simple versus complex) of the A10 ring road around Amsterdam, which has been modelled in the simulator based on a photographic realistic representation. We concluded that although the simple and complex version of the A10 ring road differed substantially in environment complexity, no effects on workload were found as measured by objective secondary task measures. It appeared that participants were able to neglect distraction by the visual complex environment and that environmental complexity does not directly influence workload.