PSY 409a, November 27, 2005

My Eighth Outline of Assigned Readings

By Karis Amano

Driving Skills

Lonero, Lawrence P. “Driver Skill: Performance and Behaviour.” Driving Lessons: Exploring Systems That Make Traffic Safer. Ed. J. Peter Rothe. Edmonton, Alberta: The University of Alberta Press, 2002. 219-230.

Instructions for this activity are found at:

www.soc.hawaii.edu/leonj/leonj/leonpsy23/409a-g23-oral.htm

Instructor: Dr. Leon James

Concept 1 – Perception

a) How we organize and make sense of information received by our senses of the environment.

b) Recognizing potential hazards is part of perception and can be influenced by our experiences. An example of this is being able to judge a safe distance between us and the car in front of us or whether or not there is sufficient distance to safely stop when a green light becomes yellow.

c) I chose this concept because after almost five years of driving, I am still not 100% confident in my judgment. It has not lead me into any trouble but it can use improving. Sometimes at yellow lights, I have to break a bit hard in order to stop so as not to enter the intersection and this upsets my dad who speeds up. Another time is when I want to make a right turn at a red light. I often find that I think to myself, “Wow, I had a lot of time and I could have made it.”

Concept 2 – The Importance of Driving Skills

a) Driving skills, abilities, and attitudes determine the driver’s actions behind the wheel.

b) Until recently, there has not been a sufficient amount of evidence that skill-improvement training leads to better drivers. Even though race car drivers have high-level driving skills, they do not necessarily have better on-road driving records. This makes it sound like driving skills are not important but, as suggested by Gregerson, “insight” is a high-level driving skill that may lead to the improvement of other targeted skills. Other studies show that lower skill training leads to lower confidence and slow licensing.

c) After reading this section of the chapter, it does make it sound as thought skill training is not vital in driving instruction but when they mentioned indirect effects, like our level of self-confidence, I started to see what the author was saying. After taking drivers’ education in high school, I felt that I had more confidence on the road than if I had not taken it, and in my experiences, confidence has always improved my performance in any task.

Concept 3 – Preparation for the Future of Driving

a) Future innovations in driving technologies will lead us to develop new tasks in skill training.

b) Many technological advances have been introduced to make our lives easier like cell phones, capable of playing mp3’s, and taking photos, but we need to learn how to use them properly to reap their benefits.

c) I have not personally had these technical difficulties with cars (except for trying to drive a stick shift but that is going backwards a bit). Even if you have a lot of fancy gadgets like navigation systems, there is really no point in having them if you do not stop to learn how to use them properly first.