Topic: Psychophysiology on the Road Towards Enhanced Traffic Safety

When: August 3 & 4, 2017 (Thursday/Friday before ICON2017)

Where: Leiden, Pieter de la Court building (Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences)

Dutch psychology has strong traditions in both traffic safety research and psychophysiology. Both fields focus on mental states that affect performance, such as fatigue, distraction, vigilance, arousal and mental workload. Until recently, these fields were operating independently. However, recent developments such as transport automation, high-tech simulators, low-cost wearable devices, high-tech amplifiers, advanced data analysis algorithms and big data approaches have made it necessary and feasible to connect these fields. Speakers from both fields will therefore exchange state-of-the-art knowledge and insights at this NVP symposium. A discussion forum will focus on perspectives on relevant traffic psychological themes. Poster sessions will show recent advances in psychophysiological developments in traffic safety research and application. In addition, we want to promote cooperation between universities and research institutes in the field of human factors research on air, rail, road and water traffic.

We aim for targeted knowledge exchange between universities, applied research institutes, and traffic policy bodies across different traffic sectors. Researchers can provide insight into the cognitive and psychophysiological indicators of traffic participation, such as fatigue and distraction. This symposium will aim to help communicate about application possibilities for basic knowledge on the one hand, and the enhancement of research tools for application and policy on the other hand. By focusing on the methods and possibilities in the present and the near future, we will try to identify which direction traffic safety research can and should go. Knowledge exchange and application of this new knowledge will further contribute to increasing road safety at land, sea and air.

In short, this NVP symposium is meant to strengthen the exchange of knowledge between traffic safety research and psychophysiology, and thereby demonstrate how fundamental brain and cognition research can be combined with highly relevant applications.