Do Augmented Reality Overlays Influence Street-Crossing Decisions for Non-Mobility-Impaired Older and Younger Adults?

Older pedestrians represent a particularly vulnerable group of road users. This paper explores how Augmented Reality (AR) can be used to assist older pedestrians in making safe road-crossing decisions. We simulated AR alerts in a large-screen virtual environment and conducted a between-subjects study with older- and younger-adult participants. The experiment had two conditions: Control (no AR) and AR displaying overlays on the roadway indicating the crossability of gaps between two vehicles. We found that participants were more selective in their crossing decisions and took safer gaps in the AR condition than in the Control condition. Older-adult participants also reported reduced mental and physical demand in the AR condition as compared to Control. Our findings show the potential for using AR for improving pedestrian safety. We provide design considerations for such a system, age-related similarities and differences, and avenues for future work in this area.

老年行人是一类尤为脆弱的道路使用者群体。本文探讨了增强现实（Augmented Reality，AR）技术如何用于辅助老年行人做出安全的过街决策。本研究在大屏虚拟环境中模拟了AR警示功能，并针对老年与青年成年参与者开展了被试间实验。实验设置了两种实验条件：对照组（无AR辅助）与AR组，后者会在路面上显示叠加标识，用以提示两车之间的间隙是否可安全过街。研究结果显示，相较于对照组，AR组的参与者在过街决策中更为审慎，且选择了更安全的过街间隙。老年参与者还反馈称，AR条件下的心理与体力负荷相较于对照组有所降低。本研究结果证实了AR技术在提升行人交通安全方面的应用潜力。本文还针对此类系统提出了设计考量要点，分析了不同年龄群体间的共性与差异，并为该领域的后续研究指明了方向。