Understanding Driving: Applying Cognitive Psychology to a Complex Everyday Task (Frontiers of Psychology) - Hardcover

Groeger, John A.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0415187524 ISBN 13: 9780415187527

Publisher: Routledge, 2000

Synopsis

This book closely examines what is involved in driving. It identifies the aspects of perception, attention, learning, memory, decision making and action control which are drawn upon in order to enable us to drive, and the brain systems involved. It attempts to show how studying tasks such as driving can help to understand how these fundamental aspects of cognition combine to facilitate performance in complex everyday tasks. In doing so it shows how a very broad range of laboratory based findings can be applied, and that through our attempts to apply this knowledge to complex everyday tasks, we gain, in return, a greater understanding of fundamental aspects of human cognition.

About this title

Review

'The book should be of interest to researchers in either traffic-safety or applied cognitive psychology, and it provides an excellent marriage of cognitive and traffic psychology.' - Contemporary Psychology: APA Review of Books

'Driving is such a pervasive activity and involves such a rich diversity of psychological processes, that this book comes as something of a pleasant surprise. The surprise is that as a thorough analysis of the psychology of driving it is a rare item. The pleasure comes from the success of John Groeger's treatment. The question of why driving has been previously neglected as an activity for serious treatment by psychologists will be left to others, but this book corrects the omission, and in doing so demonstrates in a new domain how both theory and application can benefit when developed in tandem.' - Applied Cognitive Psychology

Synopsis

A hundred years ago virtually nobody drove - indeed very few people had actually travelled at more than twenty miles per hour. A century later only a small minority of adults do not hold driving licences. In this book John Groeger examines what is involved in driving. He identifies the aspects of perception, attention, learning, memory, decision making and action control which are drawn upon in order to enable us to drive, and the brain systems involved in such activities. He also attempts to show us how studying tasks such as driving can help to understand how these fundamental aspects of cognition combine to facilitate performance in complex everyday tasks. In doing so he shows how a very broad range of laboratory-based findings can be applied, and that through our attempts to apply this knowledge to complex everyday tasks we gain, in return, a greater understanding of fundamental aspects of human cognition.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0415187524
• ISBN 13: 9780415187527
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 270