Pavlou D., Papadimitriou E., Papantoniou P., Yannis G., Papageorgiou S., “Compensatory driving behaviour of older drivers with Parkinson’s disease. Is it sufficient to counterbalance their driving difficulties? “, Proceedings of the 7th Transport Research Arena TRA 2018 Conference, Vienna, Austria, 16-19 April 2018.

Drivers with Parkinson’s disease (PD) may have difficulties in their driving competence and these deficits may lead to reduced driver performance and increased accident probability. The objective of the present paper is the analysis of traffic and safety behaviour of drivers with PD and the identification of possible compensatory strategies that these drivers follow, by applying a large driving simulator experiment. A thorough neurological and neuropsychological assessment was carried out and then a driving simulator experiment was applied. 54 elderly drivers of similar demographics went through the whole experimental procedure: 34 healthy controls and 20 PD patients. The following driving performance measures were examined: mean speed, time headway, lateral position, steering angle variability, reaction time, and accident probability, by Generalized Linear Models. Summarizing patients with PD are aware of their driving difficulties and they try to develop – not in a successful way – a compensatory driving behaviour and follow a more conservative driving pattern.