Support for distracted driving laws: An analysis of adolescent drivers from the Traffic Safety Culture Index from 2011 to 2017

IntroductionAdolescent drivers are often the focus of traffic safety legislation as they are at increased risk for crash-related injury and death. However, the degree to which adolescents support distracted driving laws and factors contributing to their support are relatively unknown. Using a large, nationally weighted sample of adolescent drivers in the United States, we assessed if perceived threat from other road users’ engagement in distracted driving, personal engagement in distracted driving behaviors, and the presence of state distracted driving laws was associated with support for distracted driving laws.MethodsThe sample included 3565 adolescents (aged 16–18) who participated in the Traffic Safety Culture Index survey from 2011 to 2017. A modified Poisson regression model with robust errors was fit to the weighted data to examine support for distracted driving laws. Models included age, gender, year, state distracted driving laws, personal engagement in distracted driving behavior, and perceived threat from other road users’ engaging in distracted driving.ResultsApproximately 87% of adolescents supported a law against texting and emailing compared to 66% who supported a universal handheld cellphone law. Support for distracted driving legislation was associated with greater perceived threat of other road users engaging in distracted driving while accounting for personal engagement in distracted driving, state distracted driving laws, and developmental covariates.DiscussionGreater understanding of the factors behind legislative support is needed. Public health interventions focused on effectively translating the risks of cellphone use while driving and effective policy will further improve the traffic safety culture.     

Exploration of the effects of task-related fatigue on eye-motion features and its value in improving driver fatigue-related technology

Mental fatigue has been lacked attention in developing eye-tracking fatigue detection system for drivers. However, it has great influence on eye movement which could account for the poor validity of current fatigue detectors only focusing on sleep-related fatigue. This work sought to investigate the influence of two types of task-related mental fatigue on eye movement by examining 8 saccade-based, 3 blink-based, and 1 pupil-based metrics. We propose that two types of task-related fatigue caused by cognitive overload and prolonged underload will induce different physiological responses to eye-motion features. Twenty participants completed a vigilance task before and after a 1-h driving with a secondary task in a virtual simulation environment, while forty participants, divided equally into two groups, finished the same task before and after a 1-h and 1.5-h monotonous driving. T-test was applied to analyse the eye-motion, subjective and vigilance data during vigilance task. We found that overload driving made drivers vigilance ability decrease. The eye metrics showed different changes in underload and overload scenario. The blink duration, the mean velocity of saccade and saccade duration increased after 1-h overload driving, while the pupil diameter decreased. However, none of those changes were observed in 1.5-h underload driving, but saccade duration had a significant increase. The fatigue response to heavy demands over short periods of driving is different from the lighter demands over long periods in terms of eye-motion metrics. Considering mental fatigue in designing an eye-tracking fatigue detection system could possibly improve its accuracy.     

Trust and intention to use autonomous vehicles: Manufacturer focus and passenger control

Autonomous Vehicle (AV) research has focused on public acceptance of and intention to use AVs, with trust emerging as important to these variables. Research on AV trust has centered on trust in vehicle performance. However, trust evaluation may include AV manufacturers and developers, and regulation pertaining to AVs; thus, we expand our measurement of trust to include beliefs based on manufacturers and regulation. In this experiment, we manipulate information regarding manufacturer focus (i.e., an emphasis on standards, regulations, and research (SRR) versus speed to market) to determine its effect on trust. When information focused on SRR, we found higher levels of trust in AV performance and in manufacturers, compared to when it focused on speed to market. In addition, information regarding passenger control (i.e., the ability to take over for the vehicle and to determine privacy settings) was manipulated to yield either high or low passenger control conditions. Behavioral Intention (BI) to use AVs was lowest when speed to market was emphasized and when passenger control was low. Furthermore, trust was tested as a mediator between perceived risk and BI. Trust in AV performance partially mediated the relationship between perceived AV performance risk and BI. In addition, trust in AV regulation partially mediated the relationship between AV privacy/security risk and BI. Researchers should continue to examine trust beyond the AV itself to encompass trust in manufacturers and regulations. Those designing and marketing AVs should carefully consider decisions that influence manufacturer/developer reputation and passenger control due to their effect on intention to use AVs.     

Evaluating driver comprehension of the roadway environment to retain accountability of safety during driving automation

Driver comprehension is a substantial component of situation awareness that involves the ability of an individual to understand the significance of an object, traffic sign, or hazard while driving. An increase in crashes related to autonomous driving systems has raised a concern regarding the safety of other roadway users due to the diminishing accountability resulting from a general lack of understanding of the limitations or disregard of the safety protocols by users. To keep drivers vigilant when engaged in partial automated systems, a methodology to monitor real-time driver comprehension was proposed. A driving simulator study consisting of 90 participants, equally split between males and females, was executed to establish driver comprehension in six different variations of driving difficulty. Joint probability density functions were created by considering percent time spent gazing, answers to probe questions, and driving performance. Based on these density functions, five levels of comprehension were devised and assigned thresholds. Overall, as task difficulty increased, a non-linear deterioration in driving speed along with an increase in total gaze duration was observed before comprehension was attained. A two-step validation protocol was also proposed to ensure similar levels of comprehension to non-automated driving from the human driver, when engaged in early forms of automation. The proposed real-time driver comprehension monitoring constitutes a first step toward developing a methodology to reinstate the accountability of safety of other roadway users when engaged in driver-in-the-loop automation systems.     

Mental health of circus artists: Psychological resilience,circus factors,and demographics predict depression,anxiety, stress,and flourishing

Circus artists perform physically demanding skills in a high-stress environment, yet little is known about their mental health. We explored emotional states of depression, anxiety, stress and flourishing in a sample of 500 circus artists. The predominantly female sample (n = 415) encompassed a range of performance levels (amateur 50%, part/full-time professional 41%, student 6%, retired 3%), with aerial acrobatics (71%) being the most frequently represented main circus discipline in the sample. Compared to previously established normative scores of a non-clinical population, circus artists scored higher on scales of emotions reflecting depression, anxiety, and stress, and lower on flourishing. They also scored higher on both state and trait resilience compared to previously established normative scores. Using a Bayesian estimation procedure, linear regression analyses showed that resilience, circus factors, and demographics (i.e., age and gender) explained between 24% and 51% of the variance in emotional states of depression, anxiety, stress, and flourishing. Consistently, circus artists with higher levels of state/trait resilience reported higher levels of psychological wellbeing, indicated by lower levels of emotional states of depression, anxiety and stress, and higher levels of flourishing. Therefore, the development of interventions for circus artists who experience lower levels of psychological wellbeing appears warranted.     

Too bored for sports? Adaptive and less-adaptive latent personality profiles for exercise behavior

Physical exercise is an effective tool for improving public health, but the general population exercises too little. Drawing on recent theorizing on the combined role of boredom and self-control in guiding goal-directed behavior, we test the hypothesis that individual differences in boredom and self-control differentiate high from low exercisers. The role of boredom as a non-adaptive disposition is of particular interest, because research on boredom in sports is scarce. Here, we investigate the role of such individual differences in self-reported weekly exercise behavior (in minutes) in a sample of N = 507 participants (n = 200 female, M_age = 36.43 (±9.54)). We used the robust variant of Mahalanobis distance to detect and remove n = 51 multivariate outliers and then performed latent profile analysis to assess if boredom (boredom proneness; exercise-related boredom) and self-control (trait self-control; if-then planning) combine into identifiable latent profiles. In line with theoretical considerations, the Bayesian Information Criterion favored a solution with two latent profiles. One profile was characterized by higher-than-average exercise-related boredom and boredom proneness and lower-than-average self-control and if-then planning values. This pattern was reversed for the second profile. A one-sided Bayesian two-sample t-test supported the hypothesis that the first profile is associated with less exercise behavior than the second profile, BF = 16.93. Our results foster the notion of self-control and if-then planning as adaptive dispositions. More importantly, they point to an important role of boredom in the exercise setting: exercise-related boredom and getting easily bored in general are associated with less exercise activity. This is in line with recent theorizing on boredoms' and self-controls’ function in guiding goal-directed behavior.     

Exercise is medicine… when you enjoy it: Exercise enjoyment,relapse prevention efficacy,and health outcomes for youth within a drug and alcohol treatment service

ObjectiveEvidence for the effectiveness of exercise as therapy for youth substance use disorder (SUD) is scarce. In this study, we investigated associations between exercise enjoyment and recovery outcomes for youth undergoing residential SUD treatment.MethodUsing ecological momentary assessment, each week participants reported perceptions of exercise enjoyment, relapse prevention efficacy, self-esteem, and physical health, and associations between these variables were assessed at both between- and within-person levels. There were 97 participants (age: M = 17.5, SD = 1.57, range = 14 to 21; 37 female, 60 male), with a final sample of 64 due to participants (n = 33) discontinuing treatment within 2 weeks of commencement. Of the remaining sample, 50% (n = 32) completed 3 or more assessments, 40% (n = 26) completed 5 or more, and 25% (n = 16) completed 7 or more.ResultsRelapse prevention efficacy, self-esteem, and perceived physical health increased over time in the program. Youth who, on average, enjoyed exercise more had higher self-esteem, perceived physical health, and relapse prevention efficacy than those who enjoyed it less. Additionally, on occasions when youth enjoyed exercise more (relative to their own average), they reported higher self-esteem, perceived physical health, and relapse prevention efficacy than on occasions when they reported enjoying it less.ConclusionParticipation in—and importantly, enjoyment of—exercise was linked to key health indices and predictors of relapse for youth during SUD treatment. These findings demonstrate that participation in enjoyable structured exercise may provide an important component of successful SUD treatment.     

Social identity leadership in sport and exercise: Current status and future directions

The social identity approach is fast becoming a prominent framework for understanding effective leadership in sport and exercise contexts. The last five years, in particular, has seen a proliferation of research informed by the identity leadership approach, with a focus on two broad outcomes: performance and health. Using these two key outcomes as an organising framework, we provide a critical narrative review of research that has examined the presence, role, and benefits of identity leadership in sport and exercise contexts, and identify fruitful avenues for future research. Applying a broader lens, we then make five key recommendations for future identity leadership research in sport and exercise contexts. Specifically, we highlight the need for research (a) using more rigorous and varied research designs, (b) using stronger measures, (c) comparing the effects of identity leadership to the effects of other types of leadership, (d) assessing further potential mediators of relationships between identity leadership and key outcomes, and (e) exploring the possible dark side of identity leadership.     

寻找镜中的自我：精神分裂症患者的视觉观点采择

精神分裂症患者的视觉观点采择影响其必要的社交活动和生活质量。本文通过对精神分裂症患者视觉观点采择的研究进行梳理,总结出相关的心理特点：精神分裂症患者的视觉观点采择过程受损,表现出自我中心性和他人中心性。在神经生理上表现出与视觉观点采择相关的脑区激活减弱。可能的原因是患者认知功能中反应抑制能力和心理旋转能力的受损所致,建议采用认知干预疗法可能会改善患者的视觉观点采择能力。目前的研究论证了精神分裂症患者视觉观点采择过程的损伤,对于不同水平的视觉观点采择下精神分裂症患者的认知模式还未有明确的定论,未来的研究可以从该角度入手,更加明确精神分裂症患者不同水平视觉观点采择的特点和神经生理活动。     

Active school travel is associated with fewer suicide attempts among adolescents from low-and middle-income countries

Background/Objective: This study explored the association between active school travel (AST) and suicide attempts among adolescents in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Method: We used the data from the Global School-based Health Survey, including 127,097 adolescents aged 13-17 years from 34 LMICs. A self-reported survey was used to collect data on AST and suicide attempts as well as some variables. Multivariable logistic regression was performed to assess the association between AST and suicide attempts. A meta-analysis with random effects was undertaken to identify the difference in the association between AST and suicide attempts. Results: Across all the adolescents, the prevalence of AST was 37% and the prevalence of suicide attempts was 11.60%. Adolescents who engaged in AST were less likely to have suicide attempts irrespective of gender. The country-wise analysis indicated a large inconsistency in the association between AST and suicide attempt across the countries. Conclusions: AST would appear to be a protective factor for reducing suicide attempts among adolescents. However, the association between AST and suicide attempts varied greatly across the countries. Future studies should confirm the association between AST and suicide attempts.